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Marie Louise 



THE ISLAND OF ELBA, AND THE 
HUNDRED DAYS 



BY 



IMBERT DE SAINT-AMAND 
1 1 



TRANSLATED BY 
ELIZABETH GILBERT MARTIN 



WITH PORTRAIT 



NEW YORK 
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

1895 



■z 

.13 36 



COPYRIGHT, 1891, 
BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. 



48 65 5 5 

AUG 1 3 1942 



TROW DIRECTORY 
?RINTINQ AND SO0KBI.NDING COMPANY 



(;-.' 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTEB PAGE 

I. The Return of Marie Louise to Austria 1 

II. Napoleon's Arrival at the Island of Elba 11 

III. Queen Marie Caroline 22 

IV. Marie Louise at Aix in Savoy 31 

V. Marie Louise in Switzerland « . . . 46 

VI. Marie Louise during the Congress of Vienna... 54 

VII. The Return from Elba 82 

VIII. Marie Louise during the Hundred Days Ill 

IX. The Field of May 138 

X. Waterloo 1^^ 

XI. Napoleon II 1*^2 

XIL Malmaison 200 

XIII. ROCHEFORT 21^ 

XIV. The Bellerophon 238 

XV. The Northumberland 260 



MARIE LOUISE, 

THE ISLAND OF ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED 

DAYS. 

I. 

THE RETURN OP IVtARIE LOUISE TO AUSTRIA. 

FROM the double point of view of psychology 
and history it is a sad but curious task to study 
the gradations by which the Empress Marie Louise 
was, little by little, transformed from a devoted and 
irreproachable wife into a forgetful, indifferent, and 
faithless one. When she left the soil of France, her 
sentiments toward her husband were still honest. If 
she had not rejoined him at Fontainebleau, the fault 
should be attributed to him rather than to her. To 
the very end she had fulfilled her duties as Regent 
with exactness and loyalty, and Napoleon rendered 
her entire justice on this point. We believe that, 
when she entered Switzerland, she was still minded 
to go to Elba very soon. During the early days of 
her sojourn at Schoenbrunn she remained more French 
than Austrian. She greatly preferred the Duchess of 
Montebello to any of the Viennese court ladies ; she 
showed high esteem for Madame de Montesquiou, M. 

1 



2 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBED DAYS. 

de Bausset, and M. de Meneval, who constantly talked 
to her of Napoleon and of France ; she retained her 
husband's imperial coat-of-arms upon her carriages, 
her silver, and the liveries of her attendants. Her 
household was entirely French, and at the court of 
her father she was reproached with always playing 
the part of Empress. The Countess of Montesquiou, 
who continued to fulfil her functions as governess 
with the greatest zeal, talked unceasingly of the Em- 
peror Napoleon to the little Bonaparte, as the unfor- 
tunate King of Rome was styled at Vienna. She 
taught the child to love his father and to pray for 
him. 

The Emperor Francis proceeded slowly and by 
degrees. He was too adroit to precipitate counsels 
or commands which at the first moment his daughter 
might have found cynical. He did nothing to wound 
or shock her. He permitted her to take the waters 
at Aix-les-Bains, which, in 1814, was still a French 
town, and where she went out driving in open car- 
riages bearing the imperial arms of France. 

At this time the attitude of Marie Louise was still 
absolutely correct. But the crafty Austrian policy 
understood how to find a man who should succeed in 
turning the wife from her husband. This man was a 
military diplomatist, General Count Neipperg, a re- 
lentless enemy of France and of Napoleon. Com- 
plaisant, skilful, energetic, a thorough man of the 
world, an accomplished courtier, an excellent musi- 
cian, he knew how to make his way by insinuation 



THE RETURN TO AUSTRIA. 



as well as by force. He was married to a divorced 
woman whom he had abducted from her husband, 
who was still living in 1814, and by whom he had 
several children. He had but one eye, having lost 
the other in battle, and he wore a black bandage to 
hide the scar. He might have been the father of 
Marie Louise, for he was by twenty-one years her 
senior. Who could have imagined that this man 
would be the successor of the Emperor Napoleon? 
General Neipperg, as husband of the Empress Marie 
Louise, is not less astonishing than the Widow Scar- 
ron, the spouse of the Sun-King. In history we pass 
from one surprise to another, and find in destiny a 
fantastic something which causes the life of peoples 
as well as of individuals to seem like a dream. 

After the abdication at Fontainebleau, Napoleon 
was not yet, in appearance at least, on ill terms with 
his father-in-law. On April 16, 1814, the Emperor 
Francis had written him thus, from Rambouillet : — 

"Monsieur my Bkothee, and Dear Son-in- 
Law: The tender soUcitude which I feel toward 
the Empress, my daughter, has induced me to meet 
her here. I arrived only a few hours ago, and I am 
but too well convinced that her health has suffered 
extremely since I saw her last. I have decided to 
propose her return to the bosom of her family for 
some months. She is in the greatest need of calm 
and repose, and Your Majesty has given her too many 
proofs of veritable attachment, for me to doubt that 
you will consent to my wishes and approve my deter- 



ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 



mination. When she is restored to health, my daugh- 
ter will take possession of her territory, which will 
quite naturally bring her nearer to the abode of Your 
Majesty. Doubtless it would be superfluous for me 
to give Your Majesty the assurance that your son 
will form a part of my family, and that, during his 
residence in my dominions, I shall share the solici- 
tude owed him by his mother. Receive, Monsieur 
my brother, the assurance of my most distinguished 
consideration. I am Your Imperial Majesty's at- 
tached brother and father-in-law, Francis." 
But it was not this letter that expressed the real 
sentiments of the Emperor of Austria; these were 
contained in the one he had written five days earlier 
to Prince Metternich, in which these significant lines 
occur: "The important thing is to get Napoleon 
away from France ; and God grant he may be sent 
very far ! You were right not to defer the conclusion 
of the treaty until I should arrive in Paris, for it is 
only by this means that an end can be put to the war. 
I do not approve the choice of the Island of Elba as 
a residence for Napoleon ; they take it from Tuscany ; 
they dispose of things which properly belong to my 
family in favor of foreigners. This must not occur 
again. Besides, Napoleon remains too close to France 
and to Europe. However, if the thing cannot be 
prevented, we must try to secure that Elba revert to 
Tuscany aftei Napoleon's death; that I be named 
co-guardian of the child for Parma ; and that, in case 
of the death of my daughter and the child, the terri- 



THE RETURN TO AUSTRIA. 



tory destined for them be not retained for the family 
of Napoleon." 

It is more than evident that the Emperor Francis, 
even admitting that he had ever had any sympathy 
with his son-in-law, which is doubtful, no longer re- 
tained the slightest trace of it. He thought him a 
danger to Europe in general, and to Austria in par- 
ticular. Napoleon still preserved his illusions ; he 
imagined that his father-in-law was seriously inter- 
ested in his fate and had obtained for him the sover- 
eignty of the Island of Elba, poor flotsam from a 
colossal sliipwreck. Napoleon deceived himself. For 
the Island of Elba he was indebted solely to the 
magnanimity of the Emperor Alexander, whom he 
had injured so deeply, and w^ho behaved hke a 
generous enemy. The Austrian, on the contrary, 
showed himself implacable towards the man to whom 
he had pardoned neither Wagram nor Marengo. 

On May 2, 1814, Marie Louise left France. Es- 
corted by a detachment of Swiss cavalry, which re- 
ceived her at the frontier, she entered Basle the same 
day between a double row of Smss, Austrian, and 
Bavarian troops. Her suite and that of her son was 
composed of the Countess of Montesquiou, who still 
retained her post as governess to the little Prince ; 
the Duchess of Montebello, who, although not a lady- 
of-honor, had wished to accompany the Empress as 
far as Vienna, in order to delay for a few days a 
separation which was painful to them both ; the 
Countess of Brignole, who had succeeded Madame 



6 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

de Montebello, and who was to remain with and die 
in the service of Marie Louise; General Cafarelli; 
Baron de Saint- Aignan ; Doctor Corvisart, the surgeon 
Lacorner, who intended to return to France in a few 
days with the Duchess of Montebello; Baron de 
M^neval; Madame Hureau de Sorbec ; Baron de 
Bausset, Madame Rabusson, and Madame Soufflot, 
who expected to remain for several years longer in 
attendance on the Empress. Nothing that concerned 
her personal service was changed. She retained the 
same individuals, the same display, the same customs, 
the same household arrangements, the same etiquette, 
the same domestics, the same equipages. Her retinue 
occupied twenty-four carriages. The expenses of the 
journey across France amounted to fifty thousand 
francs. Marie Louise travelled as a sovereign : and 
yet the little King of Rome perceived a change in his 
destiny. " Ah ! " said he, " I see very well I am no 
longer a king, for I have no longer any pages." 

At Basle, Marie Louise received a letter which 
Napoleon had addressed to her from Frejus, on April 
28, 1814 ; it revived in her heart the regret she had 
often expressed for not having gone to meet her 
husband at Fontainebleau. M. de Mdneval also 
received a letter, dated at Frejus, in which General 
Bertrand said to him : " We had a sad journey, as 
you can easily believe ; good enough through nearly 
the whole of France, where the Emperor received 
testimonies of regret, and the respect due to his 
position; but in Provence we were exposed to in- 



THE RETURN TO AUSTRIA. 



suits which, happily, have not been repeated. You 
must be aware how greatly we desire that the Em- 
press should divide her time between Parma and 
the Island of Elba; we should be so happy to see 
her now and then. She has been so kind to my wife 
and me that I desire this more keenly than any one. 
I beg you to lay at her feet the homage of my 
respectful devotion. The Emperor continues in good 
health, notwithstanding the cruel position in which 
he has been placed for the last month." 

At this moment the ties which attached Marie 
Louise to Napoleon were not broken. We desire 
no other proof of it than this long letter which she 
wrote to her father from Zurich : " At Basle I had 
the consolation of receiving news from the Emperor. 
He is well, but he is very much pained by the manner 
in which he was received in Provence. He has also 
other anxieties about which I wish to consult you. 
You know how disagreeable it is to me to speak of 
money. But I think it my duty, as wife and mother, 
to explain to you the condition in which the Emperor 
has been placed, and to beg your intervention. I do 
not ask anything for myself, because I believe that 
if I were in need, you would not let me want for 
anything. The Emperor has very little money with 
him. Ten or twelve millions, the fruit of his econo- 
mies on the civil list for twelve years, and a great 
number of snuff-boxes set round with brilliants, are 
at Orleans, confiscated unlawfully by a commissary 
of the Provisional Government. All this belongs to 



8 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

the Emperor and my son. They have even carried 
off his library and other things which he used daily. 
I entreat you to employ all possible means that he 
may be put in possession of what is his. Things 
which belonged to the crown — diamonds, bank de- 
posits, and other papers — have been returned through 
the intermediary of the directors or treasurers. The 
Emperor has been credited on the civil list with an 
annuity of two millions ; but the manner in which 
the government is acting does not permit the hope 
that it will ever -be paid, unless you, my dear father, 
whose character is so just, defend the interests of 
your son-in-law, who is no longer your enemy. My 
absolute confidence in your generosity and your 
goodness induces me to make this application. I am 
sure that my confidence will not be deceived." 

While Marie Louise, still faithful to her duties, 
thus pleaded the cause of her husband, the Austrian 
oligarchy was seeking every possible means to make 
their separation final. Nothing was left undone 
which could give the return of the dethroned sover- 
eign to her own country the appearance of a victory 
rather than a defeat. Marie Louise was received 
everywhere with the same eclat, the same respect, 
the same splendor as in the palace of the Tuileries. 
" Our journey," said Baron de Bausset, who was one 
of her suite, " was more like a triumph than a festi- 
val; one might justly have thought that Austria, 
obliged for a time to part with an adored princess, 
celebrated her return as a conquest. The sovereigns 



THE RETURN TO AUSTRIA. 



of Baden, Wiirtemberg, and Bavaria, whose extreme 
frontiers we crossed, sent deputations of the highest 
crown officials to meet her ; nothing was lacking but 
triumphal arches to make one believe that we were 
on the faithful and submissive soil of the old Con- 
federation of the Rhine. After having admired the 
famous falls of the Rhine, near Schaffhausen, and 
the beautiful lakes of Zurich and Constance, we 
arrived at the Tyrol." There the people saluted the 
august traveller with transports of joy and enthu- 
siasm which verged on frenzy. 

The Tyrol, which Napoleon had annexed to Bavaria 
against the wishes of its inhabitants, still belonged 
to that power, but in a few weeks it was to be re- 
stored to Austria. The Tyrolese considered the pas- 
sage of Marie Louise an occasion for displaying their 
sentiments of affection and loyalty to the Hapsburg 
dynasty. At Fuessen, Reutte, Innspruck, and Salz- 
burg the excitement was general. Snow fell in vain. 
Nothing could chill the people's enthusiasm. These 
brave and loyal Tyrolese, whom Alfred de Musset 
has described as 

" a people heroic and proud, 
Mountaineers like the eagle, and free like the air," 

celebrated the arrival of the daughter of the Austrian 
Emperor as a signal of deliverance. They unhar- 
nessed the horses from her carriage and that of her 
son, and drew them with their own hands. All along 
the route fireworks were set off to the flourish of 



10 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBEB BAYS. 

trumpets, responded to by troops of singers so placed 
that their voices sounded like distant echoes. The 
towns were illuminated. At every chateau where the 
wife and son of Napoleon reposed, Tyrolese in yellow 
hats adorned with green feathers mounted guard. 
Never did sovereign receive a warmer welcome. 

After leaving Salzburg, Marie Louise journeyed 
towards Vienna by the way of Moelk. At the abbey 
of this name she found Prince Trautmansdorff, chief 
equerry, who had been despatched by the Empress of 
Austria, to inquire at what hour in the morning she 
would leave there. Four leagues from Vienna, be- 
tween Saint Poelten and Siegartskirchen, she met her 
step-mother, the Empress of Austria, who had come 
to bid her welcome, and who was accompanied by 
Countess Lazanski, who had been grand mistress of 
the household to Marie Louise until her marriage. 
When the carriages came together, the Empress of 
Austria resigned hers to the Duchess of Montebello 
and Countess Lazanski, and entered that of her step- 
daughter. On the same evening. May 18, 1814, Marie 
Louise arrived at the Castle of Schoenbrunn, the end 
of her journey. She was received there by the arch- 
dukes, her brothers, and her uncles. Her sisters, 
who were waiting. for her at the door of her apart- 
ments, threw their arms about her, and felicitated her 
on her return as if it were a happy miracle. And, 
beholding once more the places where her infancy had 
been spent, the former Empress of the French felt 
all her German patriotism reawaken in her soul. 



II. 

napoleon's arrival at the island of ELBA. 

MARIE LOUISE crossed the frontier of France 
for the last time, May 2, 1814. On the follow- 
ing day Napoleon reached Elba on the English frigate 
Undaunted. He had not been free from disquieting 
thoughts concerning his probable reception there. 
Would the French garrison, commanded by General 
Dalesme, the governor of the island, deliver up to 
him the territory they guarded? Among the island- 
ers there were some who wished to be called English ; 
others who desired to be free from any master. On 
several promontories might be seen floating, almost 
side by side, the white flag and the tricolor. 

Toward nightfall on May 3 the Undaunted neared 
Porto-Ferrajo and hove to about a quarter of a league 
from the toAvn. A few minutes later she put off a 
small boat containing General Drouot, the Emperor's 
commissary, Count Klamm, and Lieutenant Smith. 
They were the bearers of an order from the French 
government, directing General Dalesme to deliver 
his command to General Drouot, together with the 
island, the forts, and all munitions of war. The 

11 



12 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

latter, on landing, received from General Dalesme 
the keys of the town, the forts, and three hundred 
and twenty -five cannon. 

Tliis accomplished, General Dalesme went on board 
the English frigate, accompanied by all the local 
authorities, who were anxious to present themselves 
to their new sovereign. Napoleon questioned them 
concerning the island and its inhabitants and then 
dismissed them, after having ordered the sub-prefect 
to convoke the mayors and the parish priests. The 
population of Porto-Ferrajo, convinced that the Em- 
peror had brought great treasures with him, had 
already assembled in the public square, and were 
impatiently awaiting their illustrious monarch. But 
at eleven o'clock. Napoleon, having tacked about the 
island, caused General Dalesme to be informed that 
his formal entry would be deferred to the afternoon 
of May 4. 

On the morning of that day the following procla- 
mation of General Dalesme was found posted on the 
walls of Porto-Ferrajo : — 

" Inhabitants of the island of Elba : the vicissitudes 
natural to humanity have brought the Emperor Na- 
poleon hither; his choice has given him to you as 
sovereign. Before entering these walls, your new 
jad august monarch addressed to me the following 
s rords, which I hasten to make known to you, because 
they are the pledge of your future happiness : ' Gen- 
eral, I have sacrificed my rights to the interests of 
mv country, reserving to myself, with the consent of 



.NAPOLEON'S ARRIVAL AT ELBA. 13 

all the Powers, the sovereignty and ownership of the 
Island of Elba. Be so good as to make the people 
acquainted with the new state of affairs, and the 
choice I have made of their island for my residence ; 
I have selected it on account of the mildness of their 
manners and their climate. Tell them that they will 
always be the object of my most lively interest.' — 
Elbans ! there is no need of comment on these words. 
They fix your destiny. The Emperor has judged you 
rightly. I owe you this justice, and I render it. 
People of Elba, I shall soon leave you. My depart- 
ure will pain me, for I love you sincerely ; but the 
thought of your happiness will sweeten my sorrow, and 
in whatever place I may be I shall remain near this 
island in spirit, through my memory of the virtues of 
its inhabitants and the mshes I shall form for them." 

By noon the troops were under arms, and the 
authorities assembled at the wharf. The Emperor's 
landing at three o'clock was announced by a salute 
of twenty-one guns from the English frigate and as 
many from the guns of the fortress. Napoleon was 
at once harangued by the authorities of the island, 
and he responded very nearly in these words : — 

" The mildness of your climate, and the romantic 
scenery of your island, have decided me to choose it, 
among all my vast domains, for the place of my abode. 
I hope that you will know how to appreciate this 
preference, and that you will love me like submissive 
children; you will then find me always disposed to 
have for you the solicitude of a father." 



14 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

As soon as Napoleon had finished this little speech, 
three violinists and two violoncellists who accom- 
panied the Elban officials began to play ; the Emperor 
placed himself under a canopy, and was conducted in 
procession to the church, where the Te Beum was 
intoned. Strange irony of fate — the fallen sovereign 
of an immense empire causing the Te Beum to be 
chanted because he has lost all his dominions except 
the Island of Elba ! 

The ceremony ended. Napoleon went to the town 
hall, where he was to lodge. The hall which was 
ordinarily used for public balls had been ornamented 
with a few little pictures and some chandeliers. In 
the middle of it a throne had been hastily erected, 
and decorated with gilded paper and fragments of 
scarlet cloth. Many of the crowd that followed the 
sovereign were allowed to enter. He urged the 
mayors to maintain order in their communes, and 
the pastors to preach concord among their flocks. 
Then the new colors were hoisted, as we learn from 
the subjoined official report : — 

" To-day, May 4, 1814, His Majesty the Emperor 
Napoleon, having taken possession of the Island of 
Elba, General Drouot, governor of the island in the 
name of the Emperor, raised the new flag above the 
forts ; a white ground crossed diagonally with a red 
band sown with three bees upon a ground of gold. 
This standard was saluted by the batteries of the 
coast forts, the English frigate Undaunted., and the 
French men-of-war which were in the harbor. In 



NAPOLEON'S ARRIVAL AT ELBA. 15 

witness whereof, we, commissioners of the Allied 
Powers, together with General Drouot and General 
Dalesme, have signed this report." 

The next morning Napoleon went out on foot at 
five o'clock to visit all the public institutions. He 
did not come in until nine o'clock, having over- 
whelmed with questions every one he met. He com- 
manded various alterations. He would have liked to 
transform the barracks of Saint Francis at once into a 
palace wherein he might take up his residence. On 
May 6, he started very early to go and see the mines 
at Rio. He examined everything with scrupulous 
attention, and gave great praise to the director of the 
mines. He was occupying himself as diligently with 
an island twenty leagues in circumference and con- 
taining twelve thousand inhabitants, as he had done 
with the gigantic empire which extended from Rome 
to Dantzic. The same day, with a view to gaining 
the affections of the Elbans, he contributed sixty 
thousand francs toward the construction of roads long 
contemplated, but never begun for want of funds. 
He possessed this sum in uncoined gold, and he had 
it minted, in order that his generosity might produce 
a greater effect when his servants carried it in sacks 
across the town. Nobody talked of anything but his 
immense treasures and the prodigies he was going to 
perform. The people were enthusiastic for their new 
sovereign : he inflamed their southern imaginations. 

On May 6, the Vicar-General Arrighi issued a 
charge which resembles a hymn of thanksgiving : — 



16 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

" To my well-beloved in the Lord, my brethren of 
the clergy, and all the faithful of the island, health 
and benediction. Divine Providence, which in its 
benevolence irresistibly disposes all things, and as- 
signs their destinies to nations, has willed that in the 
midst of the political changes of Europe, we should 
become for the future the subjects of Napoleon the 
Great. The Island of Elba, already celebrated for 
its natural productions, will hereafter become illus- 
trious in the history of nations by the homage it 
renders to its new Prince, whose glory is immortal. 
The Island of Elba, in fact, takes rank among nations, 
and its narrow territory is ennobled by the name of 
its sovereign. Raised to so sublime an honor, it re- 
ceives in its bosom the Anointed of the Lord^ and 
the other distinguished personages who accompany 
him. . . . What wealth is about to inundate our 
country ! What multitudes will hasten from all parts 
to gaze upon the hero I The first day that he set foot 
upon this shore he proclaimed our destiny and our 
happiness. '/ luill he a good fatlier^ said he; ^he 
my beloved children.'' Dear Catholics, what words of 
tenderness ! What expressions of good-will ! What 
a pledge of your future ielicity ! May these words 
charm your thoughts delightfully and be strongly 
imprinted in your souls; they will prove an inex- 
haustible source of consolation ! " 

Never had Napoleon been more lauded in the days 
of his greatest splendor. May 7, he removed to the 
building intended for the military engineers, ceding 



NAPOLEON'S ARRIVAL AT ELBA. 17 

to its officers, until they should depart, the rooms he 
had occupied at the town-hall. The building was 
only one story high, with six front windows; but it 
was isolated, had a pretty garden, and commanded 
views of the city and the sea. From among the citi- 
zens he chose four chamberlains, giving them salaries 
of twelve hundred francs ; three orderlies ; and two 
stewards of the palace. This little court of Porto- 
Ferrajo bore small resemblance to the splendid court 
of the Tuileries. 

The Emperor announced that he would receive 
ladies twice a week, at eight o'clock in the evening, 
and they accepted this flattering invitation. Napoleon 
made his appearance among them, and asked each 
the name and profession of her husband. Most of 
them replied that they were engaged in commerce. 
The Emperor desired to know Avhat branch of com- 
merce. One was a baker; another a butcher; and 
so on. Chateaubriand says : " Bonaparte was con- 
tinually returning throughout his life, to the two 
sources whence it sprang, democracy and royal power. 
His power came to him from the masses of the people ; 
his rank from his genius. So one sees him pass 
without effort from the public, square to the throne ; 
from the kings and queens who thronged about him 
at Erfurt, to the butchers and oil-sellers who danced 
in his grange at Porto-Ferrajo." 

From the 7th of May to the 25th, the Emperor 
busied himself with the repairs on his house, and in 
fencing the approaches to it. He superintended the 



18 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



work himself ; by five o'clock in the morning he was 
among the masons in buckles and silk stockings. 
On May 25, arrived the frigate Bryade^ commanded 
by Vicomte de Moncabrid, and the brig Inconstant^ 
commanded by Vicomte de Charrier-Moissard. The 
frigate was to take back the French garrison from 
the island, and the brig to remain for Napoleon. 

Before the departure from Fontainebleau, General 
Drouot had chosen for the Emperor among the Old 
Guard, all of them ready to follow their sovereign, 
something like six hundred grenadiers and foot-sol- 
diers, one hundred cavalry-men, and a score or so of 
marines; in all, seven hundred and eighty picked 
men. Having marched from Fontainebleau to Savona, 
these brave and faithful soldiers embarked on five 
English transports, and landed at Porto-Ferrajo, in 
the night of May 25-26, 1814. Their arrival caused 
Napoleon great joy. At the sight of them he felt all 
his ambition and military ardor rekindle. Chateau- 
briand, in his Memoires d'' outre-tomhe, has remarked : 
" The Allied Powers felicitated themselves on having 
left him, in derision as it were, a few hundred sol- 
diers ; he needed no more than that to summon all 
Europe once more to arms." To his little band the 
Emperor added sixty Poles whom he sent for from 
Parma ; moreover, just as the two French battalions 
of the 35th Light Infantry were about to take ship 
for France, he announced that he would keep with 
him as many as, having been released from military 
service, would consent to enroll theinselves under 



NAPOLEON'S ARRIVAL AT ELBA. 19 

his flag. He managed in this way to retain about 
three hundred, nearly all Corsicans. He further 
added some three hundred Elbans to his little army, 
and thus found himself at the head of fifteen hundred 
soldiers. He organized a vigilant police throughout 
the island and made an excellent place of Porto- 
Ferrajo. The town was no longer recognizable. 
Workmen of all trades established themselves there. 
Foreigners flocked in, drawn either by curiosity or 
the hope of speculating to advantage. The price of 
all wares doubled ; rents rose to extravagant figures. 
General Bertrand wrote. May 27, 1814, to M. de 
M^neval: "The Emperor is very happy here, and 
seems to have entirely forgotten how differentlj'" he 
was situated a short time ago. He is very busy 
adorning and furnishing his house, and in finding a 
site for a country-seat. We often speak of our excel- 
lent Empress." And again, June 25: "We learn 
from the newspapers that the Empress has arrived 
at Vienna. The Emperor continues well. We go 
about a good deal on horseback, as well as in boats 
and carriages. The Emperor's dwelling is already 
much improved, and others are being arranged in 
various places throughout the island. We hope soon 
to receive news from the Empress and the Prince 
her son." 

Napoleon was still under the delusion that his wife 
and son would rejoin him at Elba in a few weeks, 
and this hope delighted him. On June 26, the im- 
perial guard gave an entertainment to the inhabitants. 



20 ELBA, AND THE EUNBBEB DAYS. 

There was a ball, at which the Emperor made his 
appearance, and walked about the room, chatting 
with and questioning the ladies, as he had done at 
the Tuileries. 

On the whole, the time which Napoleon passed at 
Elba was not unhappy. After so many emotions, he 
needed some repose. A delightful climate, the sea- 
views, the language of the people, which was his 
mother tongue, the battalions of his Old Guard, the 
fanatical devotion of his attendants, who were ready 
to shed the last drop of their blood for him, — all 
this was not without charm. He gave his little 
island the same solicitous care that he had given his 
immense empire. Does not a captain occupy him- 
self with his company as fully as a commander-in- 
chief with his army? The interest one takes in 
things is not measured by their importance. A 
laborer often loves his thatched hut more than a 
sovereign does his palace. Napoleon regarded him- 
self as spending the season at Elba, so to say, and 
had a presentiment that some day or other he would 
leave it. Moreover, he experienced a malicious pleas- 
ure in following attentively the mistakes the Bour- 
bons were making ; and to read the French journals 
gave him infinite joy. It was all very well for him 
to say, as he sometimes did, that, as a philosopher 
weaned from human grandeur, he wished to live 
hereafter like a justice of the peace in an English 
shire. But one morning, when, on climbing a knoll 
which overlooks Porto-Ferrajo, he beheld the sea 



NAPOLEON'S ARRIVAL AT ELBA. 21 

breaking at the foot of the cliffs on every side, he 
could not refrain from exclaiming, "The devil! It 
must be owned, my island is small enough ! " 

At bottom he was tired neither of war nor of glory; 
and the ambitious sovereign of the Island of Elba, in 
his pretended retreat, resembled neither Diocletian in 
the gardens of Salona, nor Oaarles Fifth in the con- 
vent of Saint-Just. 



III. 

QTJEEN MARIE CAROLrtTE. 

WHILE Napoleon was getting settled on the 
Island of Elba, Marie Louise was resuming, 
at Schoenbrunn, the habits of her childhood and early 
youth. The life she led in this peaceful retreat must 
have been agreeable after so many tumults. Her 
mornings were devoted to her son, whose apartment 
communicated with her own, through a dressing- 
room. During the day, she drew, practised music, 
and studied Italian, a language she would need at 
Parma ; she rode ; she walked or drove in the park 
of Schoenbrunn or its suburbs; she visited the curi- 
osities of Vienna. Silent and respectful crowds 
always showed themselves eager to see her ; and the 
beauty of her son, who was the most charming child 
in the world, excited general admiration. She took 
great pleasure in the company of her young sisters : 
Leopoldine, born in 1797 (future Empress of Brazil) ; 
Marie Clementine, born in 1798 (future Princess of 
Salerno) ; Caroline Ferdinande, born in 1801 (future 
Princess of Saxe) ; Marie Anne, born in 1804 (future 
Abbess of the Chapter of the Noble Ladies of Prague). 
22 



QUEEN MARIE CAROLINE. 23 



She saw her brothers very often also : Ferdinand, the 
Prince Imperial, born in 1793; and Francis Charles 
Joseph, born in 1802. This Prince, who was the 
father of the present Emperor of Austria, was the 
playmate of the King of Rome, now called the Prince 
of Parma. 

The saddle and carriage horses, state carriages, 
and wagons laden with the private property of Marie 
Louise, which had left Rambouillet under the escort 
of Austrian troops, reached Vienna in June. Among 
the saddle horses was an Arabian which had been 
Napoleon's favorite mount. Some one proposed that 
the Emperor of Austria should use it when he made 
his ceremonious entry into Vienna, but he had the 
good taste to decline this sort of triumph. 

Marie Louise was awaiting her father with impa- 
tience. She had seen him last at Rambouillet, and 
in him were centred all her hopes. Early in the 
morning of June 15, 1814, she left Schoenbrunn to 
meet him. She stopped at Siegartskirchen, two leagues 
from Vienna. She had been preceded by her brothers 
and sisters and her step-mother. She received her 
father at the station, in the same room where Napo- 
leon, in 1805, had received the deputation which 
brought him the keys of Vienna. The Emperor 
Francis got into his daughter's carriage, and went 
with her to Schoenbrunn. He left her under no 
illusions concerning the kind of protection he meant 
to give her. "As my daughter," he said frankly, 
"all that I have is yours; as a sovereign I do not 



24 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



know you." The next day he made his triumphal 
entry into his capital, where he had not been since 
the last war. He passed through all its streets 
amidst joyful acclamations. The procession lasted 
five hours, and ended at the cathedral of Saint Ste- 
phen, where a Te Deum was intoned. Then the 
Emperor returned to Schoenbrunn with Marie Louise. 
The entire family of the former Empress of the 
French conspired to alienate her from her husband. 
There was but one among her relatives who sought 
to recall her to sentiments of duty. This was her 
grandmother, Marie Caroline, the Queen of the Two 
Sicilies, who had but just arrived at Vienna. She 
was the daughter of the great Empress Maria The- 
resa, and the sister of Marie Antoinette, the unfor- 
tunate Queen of France. Prolific, like her illustrious 
y mother, she had borne eighteen children, umong 
whom was Marie Thdrese, the second wife of the 
Emperor Francis and the mother of the Empress 
Marie Louise. The life of Queen Marie Caroline 
had been full of vicissitudes. Courageous to hero- 
ism, energetic to cruelty, religious to superstition, 
autocratic to despotism, her existence was crowded 
with revolutions, troubles, and crises of every descrip- 
tion. Born August 8, 1752, she married, on April 
7, 1768, Ferdinand IV., King of the Two Sicilies, 
who began to reign in 1759. In 1800 she came to 
Vienna, to be near her daughter and her son-in-law. 
She remained two years, seeking with all her might 
to augment, if that were possible, the hatred felt 



QUEEN MARIE CABOLINE. 25 

towards France and French ideas by the court, the 
aristocracy, and the whole Austrian people. 

When she heard of Bonaparte's victory at Marengo, 
Marie Caroline lost consciousness, and nearly died 
of apoplexy. She detested France as heartily as she 
did Napoleon. The Revolution had slain her sister, 
and the Empire had robbed her of the throne of 
Naples. There was one man, however, for whom 
her aversion was even greater than for Napoleon. 
She was probably the first to perceive, in 1813, that 
Murat was inclined to abandon France, and seek an 
alliance with Austria. She was then reigning with 
her husband in Sicily, under the domination of the 
English, whom she regarded rather as tyrants tlian 
as protectors. At this time she was half inclined to 
seek a reconciliation with Napoleon, and she sent an 
agent to Vienna to warn the French ambassador of 
the approaching defection of Murat. 

In 1814 there were, singularly enough, two queens 
of the Two Sicilies, each of them named Caroline — 
one the sister of Marie Antoinette, the other the sister 
of Napoleon ; and at this epoch, the most Napoleonic 
of the two was not Murat's wife. Nor is it less 
strange that, when these two women were struggling 
with equal fury for the throne of Naples, Prince 
Metternich was far more favorable to Caroline the 
sister of Napoleon, than to Caroline the Hapsburg, 
who had been the mother-in-law of his sovereign, the 
Emperor of Austria. The monarch of Elba must 
have been more than a little surprised if he learned 



26 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

who it was that befriended him with most energy, 
and was alone in exhorting his wife to remain faithful 
to her conjugal duty. 

Marie Louise remembered having seen her grand- 
mother when she was a child, and was glad to meet 
her again. The old Queen's journey had been a 
veritable adventure. Accompanied by a few faith- 
ful attendants, she had stolen away from Sicily, 
which her hatred of the British domination made 
her consider as a prison. So fearful was she of be- 
ing arrested by one or other of the English vessels 
crowding the harbors of Malta and the Adriatic, that 
she hastened through the Archipelago and never 
stopped until she reached Constantinople. After 
resting there a few days, she crossed the Bosphorus, 
entered the Black Sea, and landed at Odessa after a 
long and perilous voyage. From there she went to 
Vienna, proposing to employ every means in her 
power to dethrone Murat and repossess herself of 
the Kingdom of Naples. 

Queen Marie Caroline installed herself in the little 
castle of Hetzendorf, which communicated by an 
avenue with the park of Schoenbrunn. She saw 
Marie Louise and the little King of Rome, her great- 
grandchild, constantly. Not only did she show ex- 
treme affection for them both, but she was very 
gracious to all the French who made part of the 
household of Marie Louise. Baron de Meneval says 
of Marie Caroline : " This Princess, who had been 
Napoleon's declared enemy during the time of his 



QUEEN MABIE CAROLINE. 27 

prosperity, and whose opinion could not be suspected 
of partiality, professed a high esteem for his great 
qualities. Learning that I had been his secretary, 
she sought occasions to talk with me about him. 
She said he had formerly given her great reason to 
complain; that he had wounded her pride ('for I 
was fifteen years younger, then,' she added) ; but 
that now, since he was unfortunate, she had forgot- 
ten all. She could not restrain her indignation at 
the manoeuvres by which they were trying to detach 
her grandchild from the ties which were her glory, 
and thus deprive the Emperor of the sweetest conso- 
lation he could receive after the immense sacrifices 
exacted from his pride. She added that if their re- 
union was forbidden, Marie Louise should tie her 
sheets to the window and escape in disguise. ' That 
is what I would do in her place,' said she; 'for when 
one is married, it is for life.' " 

After quoting these words, M. de Meneval goes on 
to say : " But such a bold act, which would have had 
an attraction for the daring spirit of the old Queen, 
agreed neither with the character of Marie Louise, 
nor vidth her ideas of decorum. Besides, she had 
begun to be pleased with the thought of going pres- 
ently to Parma, where she would be her own mis- 
tress and free to go and come as she chose." At 
this time, however, she was not yet under the influ- 
ence of Count Neipperg ; and as she had not given 
up the idea of going to visit Napoleon now and then 
at Elba, she listened with a certain sympathy to the 



28 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

counsels of her grandmother concerning conjugal 
fidelity. 

Baron de Bausset observes that there was at this 
moment a likeness between the positions of these 
two dethroned sovereigns, one of whom was claim- 
ing the Duchy of Parma and the other the Kingdom 
of Naples. More vivacious and ardent than her 
granddaughter, Marie Caroline seemed greatly irri- 
tated by the legal obstructions put in her way by all 
the Powers, not excepting Austria. " I do not know," 
adds M. de Bausset, " whether to attribute the fact to 
her vexation at the circumspect Austrian diplomacy, 
or simply to her natural politeness and the sympathy 
she thought it her duty to feel for the innocent victim 
of a greater political convulsion than that of which 
she complained and which she had, in fact, provoked. 
In any case, it is certain that she had sufficient 
greatness of soul to apprecia.te the fidelity and devo- 
tion of those who had followed the fortunes of her 
granddaughter. Even in speaking of Napoleon, 
though she did so with the frankness of an enemy, 
yet it was that of an enemy not blind to his great 
qualities. Convinced by all the Empress said, that 
the Emperor had always treated her with the utmost 
kindness, and that she had been overwhelmed with 
the most touching and tender solicitude, the Queen 
of Sicily prevailed on her to wear again a portrait of 
Napoleon which her timidity had caused her to hide 
away in a jewel-case. Nor did she fail to be most 
amiable and caressing to the young Napoleon, though 



QUEEN MARIE CAROLINE. 29 

he was her enemy's son." M. de Bausset says very 
justly that such conduct displayed as much intelli 
gence as delicacy. 

Marie Louise and her grandmother, Queen Marie 
Caroline, were together only a few weeks. The 
Empress went to Aix, in Savoy, June 29, 1814, to 
take the baths. They were never to meet again. 
On September T the old Queen went to bed, feeling 
very well. Two hours later she was found dead, 
with her right hand extended to the bell-rope she 
had been unable to reach, and her mouth half-open, 
as if she had vainly tried to call for assistance. A 
stroke of apoplexy had put a sudden term to her 
troubled career. 

Baron de La Tour-du-Pin, then the French Minis- 
ter at Vienna, communicated the news to Prince 
Talleyrand in a despatch dated September 8, 1814 : 
" I have the honor to inform you that the Queen of 
Naples had an attack of apoplexy during the night, 
which carried her off iixstantly. The Princess had 
never been in better health. That very morning 
Count de Preville, formerly an officer of the French 
navy, and now attached to that of the King of the 
Two Sicilies, had arrived here from Parma. He 
brought news from the King which fully satisfied 
the Queen. She approved the applications he had 
made to the Austrian court. The Queen kept M. de 
Preville with her all day, and chatted about Sicily 
and all her affairs with her usual vivacity. She sent 
him away at ten o'clock, and went to bed ; at mid- 



30 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

night, the maid who slept near her, hearing a slight 
movement, asked if she needed anything, and, receiv- 
ing no answer, she rose, and found that the Queen 
was already dead." 

She was buried at Vienna, with great pomp. Baron 
de La Tour-du-Pin wrote to Prince Talleyrand, Sep- 
tember 14, 1814 : " The obsequies of the Queen of 
Naples took place on the 10th; the Mass was cele- 
brated on the 12th. The whole imperial family 
assisted at it, with the exception of the Empress. 
The Diplomatic Corps was not invited, as it is not 
customary. I thought, however, that the French 
Minister could hardly allow this circumstance to 
interfere with his giving some more particular mark 
of interest than was due from others, and I was 
present at the funeral. It seemed to me that they 
were pleased with this attention. Prince Leopold's 
sorrow has been most touching to everybody. On 
the day of his mother's death he sent a messenger 
to Madame the Duchess of Orleans [Marie Am^lie, 
daughter of Marie Caroline and wife of Louis Phi- 
lippe], by whom the news was doubtless carried 
more quickly than by the one I sent Your Highness." 

Marie Louise heard of her grandmother's death 
with great pain. In spite of the short time they had 
spent together, her sorrow was deep and keen. With 
Marie Caroline disappeared one of the most singular 
figures of the century. 



IV. 

MARIE LOUISE AT AIX IN SAVOY. 

MARIE LOUISE left Schoenbrunn, June 29, 
1814, to take the baths at Aix in Savoy. She 
had found it somewhat difficult to obtain her father's 
permission to undertake a journey which must have 
appeared strange. In 1814 Savoy still belonged to 
France, and the former Empress of the French was 
going to live simply as a private person in a town 
whose sovereign she had been only three months 
before. Napoleon felt strongly the singularity of 
this proceeding. General Bertrand wrote to M. de 
M^neval from Porto-Ferrajo, July 3, 1814: "If the 
Empress has waited at Vienna for an answer to her 
letter, the Emperor desires that she should not go 
to Aix ; if she is already there, that she should not 
remain more than one season, and that she should 
return as soon as may be to Tuscany, where there 
are baths which have the same properties as those of 
Aix. They are nearer to us and to Parma, and the 
Empress could have her son there with her. When 
M. Corvisart recommended the waters of Aix, he 
was reasoning as if the Emperor and she were still 

31 



32 JELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

at Paris ; besides, he knew nothing of these Tuscan 
baths, which have similar qualities. Her going to 
Aix displeases the Emperor all the more because 
there are probably no Austrian troops there now, 
and she may be exposed to insults from adventurers. 
Moreover, it will doubtless be disagreeable to the 
sovereigns of the country to have her so near. There 
would be no such inconveniences in Tuscany." 

But Marie Louise had taken good care not to wait 
for her husband's permission to start. She was deter- 
mined to go to Aix, whose waters she deemed indis- 
pensable to her health, and where she expected to 
meet the Duchess of Montebello, whom she then 
considered her dearest friend. She left her son at 
Schoenbrunn, in charge of the Countess of Montes- 
quiou, and started in company with the Baron of 
Meneval and the Countess of Brignole. She travelled 
as the Countess of Colorno, which was the name of 
one of her chateaux in the Duchy of Parma. When 
she passed through Munich she found Prince Eugene 
de Beauharnais and his wife at the station, and went 
to supper with them and the Princess Eoyal of Wiir- 
temberg, destined soon to become the fourth wife of 
the Austrian Emperor. 

On the 10th of July Marie Louise reached the inn 
of S^cheron, close to Geneva. There she was met by 
her brother-in-law. King Joseph, who lived in the 
Villa Prangins on the shore of the lake, and who 
gave her a hearty welcome. As she seemed to regret 
not having ordered saddle-horses to be provided for 



MARIE LOUISE AT A IX IN SAVOY. 33 



her while at Aix, Joseph offered one of his own which 
was suitable, and she rode no other during her journey. 
She made an excursion to Chamouni and the 
environs of Geneva which lasted six days, and on 
July 17 arrived at Aix in Savoy. Just as she 
was about to enter the town she met a man on 
horseback and wearing the uniform of an Austrian 
general, who bowed profoundly and then turned to 
escort her. Doubtless, she would have been greatly 
surprised had any one then predicted to her the 
part this man was to play in her existence. He 
was forty-two — twenty years older than she. He had 
but one eye ; a black bandage hid the deep scar of 
the wound which had deprived him of the other. At 
the first glance his aspect was anything rather than 
seductive. It was General Count Neipperg, who had 
acted as chamberlain to Marie Louise during her stay 
at Prague in 1812, shortly after the conference at 
Dresden. She had not noticed him then, and had 
never seen him since. The singular attachment she 
was to feel for him was by no means a case of love at 
first sight. The wily diplomatist had neither the 
beauty, the youth, nor the prestige which conquer 
without an effort. M. de M^neval declares that when 
she met him before Aix she found him uncongenial. 
"His appearance," says he, "gave her a disagreeable 
impression, which she did not try to hide. Was it 
the instinct of a heart honest but distrustful of itself 
which revealed Kim as her evil genius, and secretly 
warned her against yielding to his designs ? " 



34 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 



At this time Marie Louise had not yet broken all 
the ties which united her to her husband. She still 
wrote to him. Her household was composed of 
ardent Bonapartists like M. de Bausset and M. de 
Meneval. She had left her son under the care of a 
Frenchwoman, the Countess of Montesquiou, whose 
admiration for the Emperor was profound. She had 
invited a widow of a marshal of France, the Duchess 
of Montebello, to stay with her. Her maid of honor 
was the Countess of Brignole, a noble lady not less 
devoted to Napoleon than the Countess of Montes- 
quiou. 

With the exception of General Neipperg, all those 
who approached her during her stay at Aix, — Isabey, 
who painted her portrait ; Talma, who recited verses 
to her; Baron Corvisart, who was her physician; 
Baron de Bausset and Count de Cussy, who acted 
by turns as chamberlain, — all were imperialists who 
still cherished an actual veneration for Napoleon. 
Her servants were French, both men and women. 
Her coachmen and footmen still wore the imperial 
livery, and the arms of France were painted on the 
panels of her carriages and engraved upon her silver. 
Nevertheless, the Bourbons must have believed her 
very unlikely to aid seriously her husband's cause, 
or her residence in a French watering-place would 
not have troubled them so little. 

And yet Marie Louise was on all sides surrounded 
by souvenirs of the Empire. The house she lived in, 
situated on a little hill above Aix, was that which 



MAlilE LOUISE AT AIX IN SAVOY. 35 

Queen Hortense had occupied. This pretty town, 
so picturesque and poetic in its situation and the 
beauty of its environs, has had the privilege of con- 
soling dispossessed sovereigns. Josephine, deprived 
of the crowns of France and Italy, and Hortense, de- 
prived of that of Holland, appointed a meeting there 
in 1810. When one goes there first, the sombre moun- 
tains which rise like the citadels of God, and tower 
above the clouds floating about their summits, awaken 
a sentiment which is almost awe. But one soon 
learns to love these mountains, whose air is so pure, 
so vivifying, and that beautiful Lake Bourget, which 
sparkles or pales according to the clouds and the time 
of day. Marie Louise loved to go boating on it, and 
to visit the abbey of Haute-Combe on its shore, where 
the princes of the house of Savoy are buried. Its 
sepulchral silence, interrupted only by the monoto- 
nous chant of white-robed monks, is well calculated 
to inspire Christian reflections on the nothingness 
and inanity of worldly grandeur. 

Marie Louise was very sad during the early days of 
her stay at Aix. A real warfare had begun within her 
soul between her two countries, Austria and France ; 
she understood the false position she was in, and 
suffered in silence, for her perplexities were not un- 
mingled with remorse. Her love for Count Neipperg 
had not yet begun. His audiences with her were 
purely official, and she did not suspect that he would 
one day take the place beside her which belonged to 
the Emperor Napoleon. M. de M^neval had left 



36 ELBA, AND THE HUNBBED DAYS. 

her, July 19, to pay his wife a visit of several weeks ; 
but she kept up a close correspondence with him, 
and her letters show both the tumult in her soul and 
the confidence she continued to repose in one of the 
most faithful of her husband's adherents. 

"I shall never succeed in persuading myself to 
return to Vienna until the sovereigns have departed," 
she wrote to M. de Meneval, August 9, 1814 ; " and 
I will put off seeing my son until then. I shall 
remain at Geneva or in Parma until the Congress ; 
for it is impossible for me to stay here after the 
season of the baths is ended. I beg you to assist my 
determination by your counsel. Do not fear to tell 
me the truth. I ask advice from you as from a 
friend, and I hope you will give it to me frankly. I 
have just received a letter from the Emperor, dated 
July 4. He begs me not to go to Aix, but to take 
some baths in Tuscany. I have written to my father 
about it. You know how much I desire to please 
the Emperor ; but, in this case, ought I to do so if 
his wishes do not agree with the intentions of my 
father?" 

Her letter terminated thus : " I send you a letter 
from Porto-Ferrajo. I was greatly tempted to open 
it ; it might have given me some details. If there 
are any, I beg you to let me know. I thank you 
much for those you sent ; I needed them ; I have 
had none for so long. On the whole, I am in a very 
unhappy and critical condition; it is very essential 
for me to be prudent in my conduct. There are 



MARIE LOUISE AT AIX IN SAVOY. 37 

moments -wheii everytliing seems so strangely un- 
settled that I think the best tiling I could do would 
be to die. . . . My health is good enough. I am at 
my tenth bath. They would be beneficial if my 
mind were easy, but I cannot be contented until I 
have got out of this miserable state of uncertainty. 
I rejoice to think that you will soon be here to talk 
reasonably to me, and to quiet my poor head." In a 
postscript the Empress added : " My son is wonder- 
fully well, so they write me, and becomes every 
day more charming. The days are long until I can 
see the poor child again." 

The 15th of August came around to renew all the 
sorrows of the dethroned sovereign. She must have 
had some tender memories of both her husband and 
her son on that day, for it was the feast of each. To 
quote Victor Hugo : — 

" All drifts and passes M'ith the sea, 
World-masters, kings that cradled be, 
Bald front, fair locks of infancy, 

Great and little Napoleon ; 
All vanish and themselves efface, 
Surge upon surge rolls back apace, 
Forgetting all, the billows pass. 

Leviathan like Alcyon." 

Marie Louise also was going to forget ; but on this 
day she had not yet forgotten. What a difference 
between those two dates : August 15, 1813 — August 
15, 1814 ! What changes in one year ! At this time 
last year, France, exulting over the victories of 



38 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS, 

Lutzen and Bautzen, was expecting a speedy and 
glorious peace. Regent of the great Empire, Marie 
Louise, seated on her throne in the Tuileries, the 
imperial mantle on her shoulders, her head encircled 
with the most brilliant of the crown diamonds, had 
received the high ofBcials who came to offer their 
homage and good wishes. Afterwards, she had as- 
sisted at a Solemn High Mass and a Te Deum in the 
castle chapel. In the evening she had been received 
with cries of joy and enthusiastic acclamations when 
she made her appearance on the balcony of the Hall 
of the Marshals, to listen to the concert given on the 
terrace, and see the fireworks go up from the Place 
de la Concorde. What a difference on August 15, 
1814 ! Instead of the great illuminated capital, an 
obscure little town ; instead of a numerous crowd of 
courtiers, a handful of attendants; instead of the 
Palace of the Tuileries, a humble white house ; in- 
stead of the title of Empress of the French and 
Queen of Italy, that of the Duchess of Colorno ; 
instead of the regency of a vast empire, the posses- 
sion, or, more truly, the hope of an Italian duchy; 
instead of the King of Rome for a son, a poor child, 
of whom it was hardly known whether he would even 
obtain the right to be called the Prince of Parma. 

The former Empress may never have been ambi- 
tious, but such contrasts could not fail to cast over 
her a sombre and melancholy veil. For her the day 
was one of sadness, not of joy. She wrote on that 
date to M. de M^neval: "I have not yet received 



MARIE LOUISE AT AIX IN SAVOY. 39 



an answer from my father to the letter I spoke of in 
my last. This time of uncertainty appears to me 
very cruel and very long. I await his reply with 
much impatience, and I will let you know the moment 
it arrives. A sad presentiment warns me that it will 
contain nothing pleasant; but this is one of my 
gloomy days. How can I be gay on this feast day, 
when I am obliged to spend it so far from the two 
persons who are dearest to me? Pardon these sad 
reflections ; but the friendship you have always 
shown me gives me courage to make them, provid- 
ing you will tell me when I weary you. I beg you 
to believe in my sincere friendship. Your affectionate 
Louise." 

In a postscript Marie Louise refers to her disap- 
pointment in the matter of Parma. Count Mare- 
scalchi, formerly the Italian Minister of Foreign 
Affairs, an honorable man and well known as a 
sympathizer with France, had at first been charged 
with organizing the administration of the duchy, but 
the Austrian Cabinet had revoked his appointment. 
" M. de Marescalchi," wrote Marie Louise, " is simply 
the Austrian Minister at my court now ; my father 
has appointed M. de San Vitale my grand-chamber- 
lain, and without consulting me. This pains and 
exasperates me. M. Magawly said at Parma that 
my father had summoned M. de San Vitale to Vienna 
in order to perform his functions near me, and that 
I would be expected to go there and remain during 
the entire Congress. What a dreary prospect! I 



40 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

have a mind to ask him if I may pass the winter in 
Florence, providing that I promise not to communi- 
cate with the Emperor except through the Grand 
Duke, but I feel almost sure he would refuse. What 
I am determined on is not to go to Vienna while the 
sovereigns are there. Advise me, I pray you; I 
assure you I am greatly to be pitied." 

Throughout this entire day her mind continually 
reverted to M. de Meneval. In the evening she wrote 
again, to apprise him that she had just received a 
letter from Prince Metternich in which he enjoined 
her, in the name of the Emperor of Austria, not to 
go to Parma. In this epistle she deplores her fate as 
she had done in the preceding one : " The Duchess 
of Montebello will tell you many things I cannot 
write about. I am sad, but resigned. To-morrow will 
give me the most painful blow, for then I must bid 
her adieu. But I will not complain ; I must accustom 
myself to all sorts of trouble. What consoles me is 
the thought that there are still some kind souls who 
pity me, and I remember with pleasure that you are 
among the number." 

Marie Louise no longer found it agreeable to re- 
main at Aix when the Duchess of Montebello had 
departed. There was, in fact, no reason why she 
should prolong her stay, since her health was re-es- 
tablished. Moreover, although her conduct had been 
scrupulously prudent, yet the government of Louis 
XVIII. was beginning to be uneasy about her pres- 
ence in a French town. Prince Talleyrand had writ- 



MABIE LOUISE AT A IX IN SAVOY. 41 

ten, August 9, 1814, to Prince Metternich : " When 
you were in Paris last, my dear Prince, you told 
the King you did not approve of the journey which 
Madame the Archduchess Marie Louise had made to 
the baths of Aix. From the moment that the waters 
became useful to her health, the King would have 
closed his eyes to the inconveniences of this journey 
if he saw any. But you, my dear Prince, thought it 
might give occasion, not to intrigues, but to a good 
deal of gossip. You know what the tattle of a water- 
ing-place amounts to, and what mischief these idle 
babblers may bring about. A few rattle-pates go far 
enough to compromise themselves, and it is just this 
which it is necessary to avoid. Joseph Bonaparte, 
who is near Aix, has committed follies which he would 
not have dreamed of but for her being there. All 
this is of very small importance, and the King attaches 
none to it ; but rumors of it have reached Paris, and 
give occasion for random talk, to the Diplomatic Corps 
as well as to everybody else. People fancy they dis- 
cover grave and secret intrigues at the bottom of 
things which are perfectly natural and simple. I 
fancy, my dear Prince, that since the season of the 
baths is over for Madame the Archduchess, it may 
suit both you and us if her stay at Aix should not 
be further prolonged. Do not misunderstand, how- 
ever, the motives which induce me to make this sug- 
gestion. Adieu, my dear Prince ; preserve a kindly 
regard for me, and believe in my sincere attachment 
for yourself." 



42 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Marie Louise might have wished to remain longer 
at Aix, but she would not have been permitted to do 
so. However, she still thought about her husband. 
August 20, she wrote to the Baron of Mdneval ; " I 
have news from the Emperor dated August 6. He 
is in good health, happy and tranquil, and thinks 
much about me and his son." But the time was 
approaching when the influence of Count Neipperg, 
who was gradually insinuating himself into her good 
graces, should detach her forever from Napoleon. 
She left Aix early in September, and before return- 
ing to Vienna she made an excursion into Switzer- 
land, where Count Neipperg acted as her guide. 

As to the sovereign of Elba, he already had fore- 
bodings that he would never again see either wife or 
son. A few weeks earlier he had still hoped for 
a reunion, which he desired above all things. He 
wrote to Count Bertrand from Porto-Ferrajo, July 27, 
1814: "I have decided to go to Marciana on Au- 
gust 1. My house must be built during my absence, 
so that when the Empress comes it shall be ready for 
her." By August 9 his hopes had begun to weaken. 
Doubt is to be read between the lines of the letter he 
wrote that day to his Grand Marshal of the Palace : 
" M. le Comte de Bertrand, Colonel Laczinski, who 
starts to-day at two o'clock for Livorno, will go from 
there to Aix, bearing a letter from me to the Empress. 
Write to Mdneval that I expect the Empress by the 
end of August; that I want her to fetch my son, 
and think it strange to receive no word from her. 



MARIE LOUISE AT AIX IN SAVOY. 43 

doubtless because her letters have been intercepted. 
This absurd performance is probably the work of 
some petty official ; it cannot be that of her father. 
In any case, no one has any rights over the Empress 
and her son." 

The people of Elba, however, believed firmly in the 
speedy arrival of the Empress and the King of Rome. 
Chateaubriand remarks in his Memoir es d'' outre- 
tomhe : " Every one expected to see Marie Louise 
and her son very soon. In reality, a woman with a 
child did appear. Great mystery surrounded her 
reception, and she went to stay in a lonely cottage 
in the remotest part of the island. On the shore 
of Ogygie Calypso told her love to Ulysses, who, 
instead of listening, thought only of defending 
himself against her advances. After two days of 
repose the swan of the north took her flight again 
toward the myrtles of Baiae." This mysterious wo- 
man was the Countess Walewska, the beautiful Pole 
who had inspired the Emperor with such a passionate 
admiration some years before. Her son, born March 
4, 1810, was nearly the same age as the King of 
Rome. 

An eye-witness thus relates this singular incident 
of Napoleon's residence at Elba: " On the 1st of Sep- 
tember, 1814, the Emperor spent the entire day on 
the heights of Pomonte, sweeping the sea with a small 
telescope, as if to discover and recognize all vessels 
which came in sight. At nightfall he re-entered the 
Hermitage and sent an orderly on horseback to Porto- 



44 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Ferrajo to provide a carriage and three saddle-horses, 
which were to wait the instructions of the Grand 
Marshal of the Palace, in the road leading to the 
Place Saint-Jean. At about ten in the evening the 
orderly was at the point indicated with the carriage 
and the horses. It was a fine moonlight night and 
he presently saw a rowboat approaching the jetty. 
Three' ladies and a child landed from it, and General 
Bertrand, saluting them respectfully, led the way to 
the carriage. At the cross-roads of Prochia they met 
Napoleon riding a white horse and followed by a 
troop of lancers and Mamelukes. The carriage 
stopped, and the Emperor got off his horse. The 
right-hand door of the carriage opened, and the Em- 
peror entered it in profound silence. The procession 
set off again and did not stop until it reached the 
beach of Prochia, where, as the carriage could go no 
farther on account of the bad roads, the Emperor, 
the ladies, and the child left it for the horses, which 
had been led by the orderly. The child was carried 
by one of the ladies, and the orderly, dismounting, 
led her horse by the bridle. When they were near 
the Hermitage, Napoleon spurred up his horse and 
arrived first at a tent which had been pitched under 
a huge chestnut. A few minutes later the lady with 
the child came up and entered the tent also. They 
remained there two days and nights without being 
seen by any one else. Napoleon himself came out 
only twice to give some orders. During this time all 



MARIE LOUISE AT AIX IN SAVOY. 45 



persons were forbidden access to the hill, even Ma- 
dame Mere, who lodged in a neighboring village." 

Thus, at the very moment when Marie Louise was 
beginning to yield to Count Neipperg's influence, 
Napoleon, despairing of seeing her at Elba, had be- 
thought himself of the Countess Walewska. 



V. 



MAEIE LOUISE IN SWITZERLAND. 

THE last sparks of a very feeble flame are about 
to be extinguished. In Switzerland the former 
Empress of the French is already less attached to 
Napoleon than she had been at Aix in Savoy. The 
hour is near when he will be as a stranger to her. The 
influence of MM. de Mdneval and de Bausset dimin- 
ishes as that of Count Neipperg increases. Marie 
Louise, to whom the thought of being in Vienna at 
the same time with the sovereigns was once so pain- 
ful, is now accustoming herself to entertain it. Count 
Neipperg never leaves her. If she boldly undertakes 
so many fatiguing, not to say dangerous, excursions 
across mountains and glaciers, it is because the se- 
ducer is at her side. He is a musician, and when 
she sings, he plays her accompaniments. He is an 
assiduous, devoted, obsequious chamberlain ; perhaps 
he is already a lover. He will presently become her 
factotum, her indispensable attendant. He vaunts 
his ability to solve all difficulties and smooth away 
all obstacles which lie between her and that Duchy 
of Parma which she thinks of as a Promised Land. 
46 



MARIE LOUISE IN SWITZERLAND. 47 

Agent and confidant of Prince Metternieh, he pur- 
sues with address and perseverance the task confided 
to him by the Austrian oligarchy. He is neither 
young nor handsome, but there is something alluring 
in his glance, his appearance, and his conversation. 
His uniform as general of hussars becomes him ; his 
manners are extremely polished, and they hide his 
ardent ambition under a cloak of modest simplicity. 
A brave soldier and a skilful diplomatist, he has the 
good taste never to talk about himself, although he 
both talks and writes with ease. Marie Louise no 
longer even thinks of rejoining her husband at Elba. 
Perhaps she would not do so even if her father ac- 
corded his permission. Her sole ambition is to reign 
in Parma, with the faithful Neipperg as her minister. 
She has forgotten France. It seems as if she had 
said an eternal adieu to the country where she had 
reigned, when parting from the Duchess. of Monte- 
bello, the only Frenchwoman whom she had loved. 

Marie Louise appreciated the beauties of nature, 
and she greatly enjoyed herself in Switzerland ; pos- 
sibly the proximity of Count Neipperg, who acted as 
guide, helped to make her find that land so charm- 
ing. September 9, 1814, she slept at Lausanne, at 
Freiburg the 10th, and at Berne on the 11th. Then 
she visited Grinwal, Lauterburn, and the Righi, with 
the Countess of Brignole and General Neipperg for 
sole attendants. " M. de Meneval and I," writes the 
Baron of Bausset, " had seen snow enough in Russia. 
We were not particularly anxious to wander among 



48 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

those mountains all covered with it." So these two 
left the field to the General, who, doubtless, was not 
sorry. 

September 20, Marie Louise came back to Berne. 
She had just heard of the death of her grandmother, 
Queen Marie Caroline, and she displayed great sor- 
row. For two days she shut herself up in her apart- 
ments, but on September 22 she made an excursion 
to Hofhill, two leagues from Berne. On returning, 
she was informed of the arrival of the Princess of 
Wales, whom she did not know, but who desired to 
meet her. This Princess was, assuredly, one of the 
most curious types of our modern times. Her father 
was Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick, 
a bitter enemy of the French Revolution, the author 
of the celebrated manifesto of 1792, and the- unsuc- 
cessful opponent of Dumouriez and Napoleon. Caro- 
line was born in 1768, and in 1795 was married to 
the Prince of Wales. In the following year she 
became the mother of the Princess Charlotte, who 
was afterwards the wife of Leopold, King of Bel- 
gium. Hardly had she recovered from her confine- 
ment when her husband separated from her on the 
plea of incompatibility of temper. Then began re- 
criminations and scandals which resounded through- 
out Europe, and never ceased until the death of 
Caroline. 

Her husband, the Prince of Wales, whose whole 
youth had been turbulent, and who had many things 
to reproach himself with, noisily accused his wife of 



MABIE LOUISE IN SWITZERLAND. 49 

adultery; claiming, even, that she had concealed a 
pregnancy. In 1808, her father-in-law, George III., 
appointed a ministerial commission to examine these 
charges. They acquitted her, so far as the latter 
accusation was concerned, declaring, at the same 
time, that her conduct had been imprudent. When 
George III. went mad, in 1811, the Prince of Wales 
became Regent. It was of him that Louis XVIII. 
said : " After God, it is to the Prince-Regent that I 
owe my restoration." 

Caroline, then, was daughter of one man, and wife 
of another, of those who were most bitterly hostile 
to Napoleon. Nevertheless, she was anxious to see 
Marie Louise, and even proposed to pay a visit to 
Napoleon himself, at Elba. When she met the 
former Empress of the French at Berne, she was 
beginning a long journey. After passing through 
Germany, she meant to visit Italy, Greece, Syria, and 
the Holy Land. Caroline was witty and agreeable, 
and she spoke French admirably. All was unusual 
about her, — face, figure, dress, and conversation. 
She wore a white muslin gown, and a large veil of 
the same stuff, which covered her head, breast, and 
shoulders. Above this was a diadem consisting of a 
single row of diamonds. Her costume resembled that 
of an ancient Greek priestess. 

In the morning of September 23 this noble but 
eccentric traveller had her first intervicAV with Marie 
Louise, to whom she showed herself extremely 
friendly. She gave her all manner of details con- 



50 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

cerning her quarrel with her husband, and the an- 
noyances to which she had recently been subjected 
in England. " Your Majesty will hardly believe," 
said she, "that I was not permitted to attend the 
Queen's drawing-room while the sovereigns of Russia 
and Prussia were there, because my husband was 
unwilling to meet me, either in public or in private. 
I complained to the Queen, and I even wrote my 
husband a beautiful letter, in which I signed myself 
the most faithful and submissive of wives [the 
Princess smiled maliciously while saying these last 
words] ; but he did not deign to answer me. How- 
ever, I did not consider myself obliged to observe 
strict seclusion on that account. I went to every 
public place to which I could gain admittance by 
paying my way. Once, when the sovereigns and my 
husband were at the opera, in a box in the dress- 
circle, I was discovered at the back of another, on 
the second tier, where I had gone in disguise. The 
people showed their good will toward me by such 
stormy applause, that these august spectators, sup- 
posing it impossible that so much homage could be 
addressed to any one but themselves, thought it in- 
cumbent on them to rise and bow to the audience. I 
was not slow in seizing this chance to avenge myself. 
Pretending, in my turn, to consider their mistake as 
an intentional act of politeness toward me, I gravely 
made them three sweeping courtesies, which excited 
loud and ironical applause." 

Caroline spoke afterwards of her daughter, the 



MARIE LOUISE IN SWITZERLAND. 51 



Princess Charlotte. " She is as charming and clever 
as one can possibly be ; but," she added, smiling, 
" after myself, I don't know a more quarrelsome 
person." 

In the evening the Princess of Wales, accompanied 
by a lady-of-honor, two chamberlains, and an equerry, 
came to dine with Marie Louise, who had returned 
her visit during the day. The dinner was very 
lively, and afterwards, the conversation turning on 
music, the Empress invited the Princess to sing 
something. " Willingly," she replied, " providing 
that it shall be a duet." Marie Louise wished to 
refuse, under the plea of her timidity, which, she 
said, made her incapable of uttering a note before 
listeners. "For my part," responded the Princess 
of Wales, " I have never been afraid, except on 
account of my friends." Marie Louise finally con- 
sented. Her voice was a soprano, as sweet and 
pleasing as herself ; Caroline's, on the contrary, was 
a full and strongly accented contralto, which accorded 
well with her energetic character. They sang the 
duet La ci darem la mano^ from Mozart's Don Juan, 
Count Neipperg playing the accompaniment, Marie 
Louise taking the part of Zerlina, and Caroline that 
of Don Juan. Would not the scene be a tempting 
one for a genre painter ? 

September 24, the Empress slept at Zurich. She 
visited some glaciers in the neighborhood, as well as 
the ruined castle of Hapsburg, the cradle of her 
ancestors. Some one of the party found an old 



52 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



scrap of iron among the ruins, and Count Neipperg 
pretended to recognize in it a fragment of Rudolph 
of Hapsburg's lance. Marie Louise either believed, 
or professed to believe, in this little fraud, and, later 
on, had bits of the chimerical lance set in gold rings, 
which she gave to various members of her circle. 

She went on to Vienna bj way of Saint-Gall, 
Constance, Munich, and Braunau, and passed the 
night in the latter city. It was the place where, on 
March 16, 1810, the house of Austria had formally 
committed her to the house of France. That day 
of profound emotions lay already far behind her. 
The Empire, that majestic and colossal edifice, which 
all men had thought indestructible, had disappeared. 
It had lasted not much longer than the frail walls 
of the pavilion where the young Archduchess had 
been confided to her new country. At that time the 
same ceremonies had been observed as had attended 
the marriage of Marie Antoinette. Triumphal arches 
had spanned the roads traversed by the august be- 
trothed. To the sound of bells, the roar of artillery, 
and the joyous flourish of trumpets, she had appeared 
before the dazzled eyes of the people like a sort of 
goddess, illuminated by the lustres of an apotheo- 
sis. And now, at the end of four years and a half, 
she was again at Braunau, alas, under what different 
conditions ! She was travelling as a private person, 
bearing the assumed title of Duchess of Colorno. 
Nothing but the memory of those distant splendors 
was left to her, and it is doubtful if even that mem- 



MARIE LOUISE IN SWITZERLAND. 53 

ory was dear. Soon it was to vanish like a dream. 
Marie Louise returned to Schoenbrunn, October 4, 
1814, the feast of Saint Francis of Assisi, and the 
name-day of her father. From that moment nothing 
that was French remained longer in her Austrian 
soul. 



VL 

MAKIE LOUISE DTJEING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 

""TXTHO would believe that the lust after pa- 
V V geants, the bursts of applause which greet 
Moliere and Harlequin at the theatres, the hunts and 
banquets, ballets and tournaments, cover so many 
disquieting cares and opposing interests, such fears 
and hopes, such ardent passions, and such serious 
affairs?" 

One is reminded of this passage from La Bruy^re 
when studying the history of that Vienna Congress, 
of which the Prince de Ligne said : " The Congress 
dances; it does not walk." The sovereigns made 
their formal entry into the Austrian capital Sep- 
tember 26, 1814. More than a thousand volleys of 
cannon greeted them from the ramparts. A contem- 
porary caricature represents the Emperor Alexander 
driving a two-seated travelling-carriage, with the 
King of Prussia as footman, and the Emperor Napo- 
leon running behind, and shouting to the Emperor 
Francis, "Father-in-law! father-in-law! they have 
put me out." The Austrian Emperor, who occupies 
the carriage, looks back, and answers, " And me in." 
The presence of Marie Louise in a city where the 
54 



DURING THE CONGBESS OF VIENNA. 55 

sovereigns who had vanquished and dethroned her 
husband were reunited was singular enough. Five 
days after her return to the castle of Schoenbrunn, 
a fete was given there which all the monarchs at- 
tended. There were drives about the gardens in 
open carriages, theatricals, and a supper in the 
Orangery. But the former Empress of the French 
remained in the seclusion of her own apartments. 
On November 9, 1814, Baron de La Tour-du-Pin, 
French Minister at Vienna, wrote as follows to 
Count de Jaucourt, who acted as Minister of For- 
eign Affairs during the absence of Prince Talley- 
rand; "The Archduchess Marie Louise is never 
present at any of the fetes and daily reunions which 
are brought about by circumstances. But she comes 
every day to see her father, and often calls on the 
sovereigns and grand duchesses who are staying at 
the palace. She is visited in return at Schoenbrunn, 
but not so as to attract too much attention. Her 
toilet seems to occupy her grea.tly, and no week 
passes without her receiving gowns and bonnets from 
Paris. At the same time, melancholy speeches es- 
cape her lips; she plays doleful airs, and says that 
, she was made for sadness. They take pains to let 
it be known that the little Bonaparte has remarka- 
ble intelligence, and he is so trained as to make him 
pleasing to the French, and especially to soldiers. 
It appears that whenever one presents himself, or 
when he speaks of them, he is expected to say 
gracious and kindly things. The fetes increase in- 



56 ELBA, AND THE HUNBBED DAYS, 

stead of diminisliing. Yesterday M. de Metternich 
gave one ; day after to-morrow there will be a grand 
dress rout, and on the 16th a tournament composed 
of twenty-four ladies and as many cavaliers." 

One might say that Marie Louise could only look 
through the keyhole at these entertainments where 
her presence was forbidden. In her father's apart- 
ments at the Burg, the imperial palace of Vienna, 
a small tribune or platform had been so placed in 
a corner of the upper gallery surrounding the great 
hall that one could see from it without being seen. 
It was the same great hall in which the festivities 
of her marriage had taken place in 1810. Hidden 
at the back of this tribune with M. de Bausset and 
Madame de Brignole, what reflections the dethroned 
sovereign must have made I She had seen at her 
own knees the same crowd of noble lords and ladies 
who now paid such assiduous court to the princes of 
the Coalition. How humble and obsequious all these 
petty potentates of the Rhine Confederation had 
been but lately before the great Napoleon! His 
wife might have said, with the author of the Bleu 
des bonnes gens : — 

** A conq'ror in his lofty hour of pride 
With laws and sceptres played as trifling things ; 
The dust from off his feet men saw 
Imprinted on the coronets of Kings. 
You crawled then, Kings, whom now men deify ! " 

Who was the princess now disputing so bitterly 
the possession of the duchies of Parma, Piacenza, 



DURING THE CONGREi^ti OF VIENNA. i)7 



and Guastalla with Marie Louise ? It was she who 
had been created Queen of Etruria by a ca^Drice of 
the First Consul. Tuscany was erected into the 
Kingdom of Etruria by the Treaty of Luneville, and 
given to Louis, Lifant of Parma ; and in May, 1801, 
before taking possession of his states, he went to re- 
ceive investiture, as it were, from Bonaparte. He was 
the son of a sister of Marie Antoinette, and his wife, 
who accompanied him, was the daughter of Charles 
IV. of Spain. It was only seven years since Marie 
Antoinette had lost her head on the scaffold, and her 
nephew in going to Malmaison to pay homage to the 
First Consul crossed the square where she was exe- 
cuted. At the Theatre Fran§ais they played (Edipe 
in his honor, and when the actor who took the part 
of Philoctete recited the verse, 

"I have made sovereigns, and I have not willed to be one," 

the audience turned toward the box where the First 
Consul was sitting with his royal guest, and broke 
into a frenzy of applause which shook the theatre. 
Oh! how insignificant this kinglet had seemed be- 
side the man of Arcole, the Pyramids, and Marengo ! 
A few days later the new King and Queen departed 
for Etruria, where they were installed by Murat. 
The Queen presently opened a friendly and grateful 
correspondence with Josephine, by whose gracious 
reception of herself and her husband she had been 
charmed. Assuredly, the all-powerful First Consul 
would have been profoundly surprised had any seer 



58 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBED DAYS. 



then come to tell him : " It is this little Queen who 
will one day seek to deprive your wife and son of 
the only strip of land remaining to them after all 
your conquests ! " 

Marie Louise was present at the general rehearsal 
of the tournament, which took place in the Hall of 
the Manege. This hall is a long parallelogram, ter- 
minating at each end in a large tribune. One of 
these was occupied by the sovereigns, and the other 
by the orchestra. Opposite the monarchs, in a tier 
of boxes placed in front of the musicians, were se- 
dately ranged the twenty-four ladies of the twenty- 
four knights about to combat in the lists. All of 
them beautiful and full of animation, they were clad 
in red velvet robes against which the lustre of their 
jewels sparkled with great eifect. The gems worn 
by Princess Paul Esterhazy, born Princess de la Tour 
et Taxis, were valued at more than six millions of 
francs. The fete was magnificent. The twenty-four 
knights, in splendid costumes, and mounted on superb 
and richly caparisoned palfreys, entered to the flourish 
of trumpets. Riding forward, they made their rev- 
erence to the sovereigns without dismounting; then, 
turning, they paid a similar homage to the ladies 
whose colors and scarfs they wore. They tilted at 
the ring, beat down helmets which had been placed 
upon manikins, and handled harmless javelins with 
precision. The tourney ended, each cavalier rejoined 
his lady and conducted her to the banqueting-hall. 
From the feast they repaired to the ball-room, where 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 59 



more than three thousand invited guests were pres- 
ent. The quadrilles, which had been arranged before- 
hand, were comprised of the most illustrious and 
highly born men and women in all Germany. Con- 
cerning the second representation of the tournament, 
Baron de La Tour-du-Pin wrote on November 30, 
1814, to Count de Jaucourt : " This fete has been 
perfectly beautiful, and the splendor of the women 
has exceeded anything ever seen. One might more 
truly say that they were clothed with diamonds and 
precious stones than that they were adorned with 
them. The ladies had given scarfs to their knights ; 
that presented by Madame de Perigord to Count* de 
Trautmansdorff, the Grand-Equerry, was sown with 
golden flowers-de-luce, with lion's claws in the fringe. 
We were childish enough to feel pleased because 
this knight carried off the honors of the day." 

Meanwhile, serious people were beginning to think 
there was a good deal of amusement going on at 
Vienna. Seldom have important affairs been treated 
with so much apparent levity. Prince de Talley- 
rand wrote to Louis XVIIL, on November 25, 1814 : 
*' After I left Prince de Metternich, he went to the 
Ridotto, for he spends three-quarters of his time at 
balls and public entertainments. His head was so 
full of the Naples business that, having met there a 
woman of his acquaintance, he told her that he was 
being tormented about it, but that he did not know 
how to give his consent. He said he respected a 
man who had made himself beloved in the country he 



60 ELBA, AND THE HUNBBEB DAYS. 

governed; and that, moreover, he loved the Queen 
passionately, and was in constant relations vrith her. 
All this, and perhaps a little more on the same head, 
was said under the mask." In his new capacity as 
courtier of Louis XVIII. Talleyrand could not par* 
don Metternich for preserving his affection for Napo- 
leon's sister, and wishing to protect in Murat a 
prince whom the Bourbons considered an upstart and 
usurper. 

The Austrian Minister was also the object of some 
sharp criticism at the hands of Baron de La Tour-du- 
Pin, who wrote to Count de Jaucourt, December 7, 
1814: "The public generally are discontented with 
the condition of affairs; they especially find fault 
with the Emperor of Russia, who loses in public 
estimation daily. Any minister but M. de Metter- 
nich would take immense advantage of this ; but 
what can be expected of a man who, in the gravest 
situation that can possibly be imagined, spends the 
greater portion of his time in follies; who was not 
afraid to have the Pacha de Surene played at his 
house, and who, ever since the Congress began, has 
spent a good many of his days in an equally futile 
way? After this, M. le Conte, you ought not to be 
surprised at the slow progress of affairs." 

This Pacha de Surene^ which was one of the Baron 
de La Tour-du-Pin's grievances, had the greatest suc- 
cess at one of the court soirees. Etienne's charming 
comedy was played in French by amateurs, who were 
the Landgrave of Furstenburg, Prince Antoine Radzi- 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 61 



will, Count Ferdinand de Waldstein, Countess Mnis- 
clieck, Princess Theresa Esterhazy, Princess Marie de 
Metternich, Countess Marassi, Princesses Marie and 
Sophie de Lichtenstein, etc. After the play followed 
tableaux in which some of the most distinguished 
persons of the court took part. The principal one 
was the Tent of Darius, after Lebrun's painting. 
Count de Schoenfeld represented Alexander the 
Great, and the beautiful Countess Sophie Zichy, 
Statira. Baron de Bausset writes enthusiastically in 
his Memoirs : " The scene was at once heroic and 
voluptuous; all the faces, all the attitudes of the 
figures in this living picture, wore expressions suita- 
ble to their age, their condition, and their situation. 
Sizygambis herself was admirable." 

On December 2, 1814, a grand rout was held at 
the imperial palace, of which an account is found in 
a letter from Vienna published in the Moniteur 
Universel, Three great halls were thrown into one 
by means of galleries and staircases, thus providing 
a space so large that ten or twelve thousand people 
might easily move round in it. The passage con- 
ducting from the apartments of the palace to this 
grand hall was adorned with shrubbery and flowers, 
and looked like fairy-land. An alley lined with 
orange-trees led to the great hall, whence could be 
seen, beyond a double staircase, the superb perspec- 
tive afforded by the grounds of the riding-school. 
The hall was decorated in white and silver, and 
sparkled with five or six thousand candles. At ten 



62 IJLBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

o'clock the sovereigns entered, to the blare of the 
trumpets and kettle-drums. The Czar and the Em- 
press of Russia opened the march, followed by the 
Emperor and Empress of Austria, the King of Den- 
mark and the Archduchess Beatrix, the King of Ba- 
varia and the Grand Duchess of Oldenburg. Having 
passed several times through the three halls, the 
sovereigns seated themselves on a platform in the 
Hall of the Manage, and watched a ballet danced 
by masked children. The fete lasted until morning. 

On that same day, December 2, the double anni- 
versary of Napoleon's coronation and the battle of 
Austerlitz, Marie Louise had paid a visit to the 
Russian Empress, who was at the Burg. While the 
former Empress of the French was with the Czarina, 
her carriage was awaiting her upon the ramparts 
near by. Some of the curious bystanders who 
flocked about it observed that the carriage panels, 
the escutcheons of the harness, and the buttons on 
the livery of the footmen still bore the imperial arms 
of France. This offended them, and when Marie 
Louise re-entered her carriage they made remarks on 
the subject which she could not fail to hear. Noth- 
ing more was needed to induce her to have these 
arms removed. She replaced them by her ow>n 
mondgram. 

Alas ! it was not merely the imperial arms which 
the forgetful wife effaced ; it was the memory of her 
husband. The captive of the Coalition, she began 
to familiarize herself with her chains and to love 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. G3 



Count Neipperg. Ever since her visit to Aix and 
Switzerland she had placed confidence in this man 
who was as much her guardian as her chamberlain. 
Baron de la Tour-du-Pin had written to Count de 
Jaucourt, on September 7, 1814 : " I do not know 
whether you have been informed that Major-General 
the Count of Neipperg has been appointed by the 
Austrian Emperor as the guardian of his daughter. 
His business is to prevent her doing anything which 
might annoy or even displease the King ; and, espe- 
cially, to watch her carefully in case she seems dis- 
posed to go to her husband. Should that happen, he 
is to advise her against doing so, and, if she persists, 
to forbid it absolutely." 

General Neipperg had acquitted himself of his 
mission to the entire satisfaction of his government. 
Marie Louise, who had once declared that nothing 
could induce her to go near the sovereigns who 
dethroned her, had ended by resigning herself with 
a good grace, not only to live in their neighborhood, 
but to receive their visits. Enchanted with the wily 
Neipperg's success, the Emperor of Austria desired 
him to act as her chamberlain throughout the Con- 
gress. He assumed, in fact, the duties of grand 
equerry and official charg^ d'affaires as well as those 
of chamberlain. And in proportion as his influence 
over the weak young woman's mind increased, she 
repelled still further all thought of a reunion with 
Napoleon. A widow during the lifetime of her hus- 
band, she ceased to correspond with him. At first 



64 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



he protested against this silence, which he did not 
fully comprehend. On October 10, 1814, he wrote 
thus to an uncle of Marie Louise, Ferdinand Joseph, 
Grand Duke of Tuscany, that Prince who had been 
so respectful toward the Napoleonic glories, and so 
assiduous at the court of the Tuileries when, as 
Grand Duke of Wurzburg, he was a member of the 
Rhine Confederation under the protectorate of the 
new Charlemagne : — 

"My Brother and Very Dear Uncle: Hav 
ing received no news from my wife since August 10, 
nor from my son for six months, I charge the Cheva- 
lier Colonna with this letter. I beg Your Royal 
Highness to let me know whether I may send you a 
letter for the Empress every week, and if you will 
forward me her replies and those of the Countess of 
Montesquieu, my son's governess. I flatter myself 
that, in spite of the events which have changed so 
many persons. Your Royal Highness still preserves 
some friendship for me." 

The Grand Duke despatched this letter to Vienna. 
Let us hear what M. de M^neval has to tell us about 
the way it was received. " One day," he says, " on 
returning from her daily visit to the imperial palace, 
Marie Louise brought back a letter from the Emperor 
Napoleon which her father had given her. The 
Emperor complained of her silence, and begged her 
to write him accounts of herself and her son. The 
letter had been delivered by a courier of the Grand 
Duke of Tusca^ny, and the Austrian Emperor had 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 65 

had it in his hands four days. It had been shown to 
the sovereigns without any doubt, for it was with 
that intention, and in order to prove his good faith 
to the Allies, that the Emperor Francis required his 
daughter to pass over to him all letters received from 
her husband. The Empress did not reply to this 
epistle, as she received no permission to do so." 

At the instance of Prince Metternich, Marie Louise 
had promised not to hold any communication wdth 
her husband without the consent of her father, to 
whom she also remitted all letters which reached her 
from Elba. Napoleon, on learning that even his 
private letters to his wife were not respected, and 
that she was forbidden to reply, ceased writing to 
her altogether. 

Yet a feeble tie still bound Marie Louise to her 
souvenirs of France. The Countess of Brignole, the 
Baron of Bausset, and the Baron of Meneval were 
still with her, and the Countess of Montesquiou con- 
tinued to be the governess of the child who had 
been the King of Rome. M. de Meneval says : 
"The first day of 1815 reanimated in the heart of 
the Empress those memories of France which had 
been so violently assailed. It is kept as a holy-day 
in France, but in Vienna no one observes it. It is 
during the preceding week that people make presents 
and pay compliments. The streets of Vienna are 
crowded with carriages and pedestrians in their Sun- 
day clothes. They seem to be burying the old year 
with honor rather than celebrating the birth of a 



66 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

new one. For a moment the Empress's return to 
French ways made us believe that all was not yet 
forgotten at Schoenbrunn. After Mass she received 
all her household in the gallery of the palace. She 
was so amiable as to offer me some charming gifts, 
products of Viennese industry, and to add to them 
one of those little picture-cards, expressive of good 
will, which it is a German custom to give one's 
friends at certain seasons of the year. Even Count 
Neipperg was cordial and attentive." 

On January 6, Feast of the Three Kings, Marie 
Louise gave a luncheon to her son, her sisters, and 
her youngest brother, the little Archduke Francis, 
father of the present Emperor. The King of Rome 
found the bean in his slice of Twelfth Night cake, 
and enjoyed the ephemeral royalty it gives — a sym- 
bol of that which destiny had torn from him. Alas, 
the little Bonaparte, as he was now called by those 
who had strewn flowers and burned incense before 
his cradle, already had enemies ! This child, not yet 
four years old, inspired the Coalition with fear. The 
least marks of good will shown toward him alarmed 
the zealous adherents of Louis XVIII. On August 
13, 1814, Baron de la Tour-du-Pin had vn*itten to 
Talleyrand : " At present the little Bonaparte is alone 
at Schoenbrunn. It is certain that the Emperor of 
Austria shows him much affection. He receives the 
honors of an archduke." On October 15 M. de 
Talleyrand, somewhat reassured, wrote to the King : 
" Bonaparte's son is no longer treated as he was on 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 07 

his first arrival at Vienna. They dress him more 
simply, and have replaced his broad ribbon of the 
Legion of Honor by that of Saint Stephen." 

M. de Mdneval says that no real kindness was 
shown to Marie Louise and her son except by her 
father and her sisters. Her step-mother and her 
brothers-in-law talked of nothing but making the 
child a bishop. The Emperor was sometimes obliged 
to silence them. Baron de Bausset also mentions 
these hostile dispositions. He says: "It was the 
general opinion in Vienna that Napoleon ought to 
be sent to Saint Helena, because Elba was too close 
to Italy and France. As to his son, he should be 
educated for the priesthood, and made to hide under 
a wretched frock that heritage of glory and grandeur 
whose very memory they wished to extinguish." 

The son of the great Emperor was already lovable 
and attractive. To his infant graces there was added 
a nameless and precocious melancholy. As the poet 
Coppee has so well said, he was 

" A young eaglet, vaguely feeling himself a prisoner," 

and he inspired a tender sympathy in every generous 
soul. Listen to the faithful M^neval, who speaks of 
him with such touching and unreserved devotion : 
" My greatest distraction was to spend a few hours 
in the apartment of the young Prince. His pretty 
ways, his gentleness, and the vivacity of his repartees 
were charming; he was then nearly four j^ears old. 
His fresh and rosy face was lighted by beautiful blue 



68 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

eyes and framed in clustering fair curls. His in- 
telligence was precocious ; he was better instructed, 
moreover, than many older children. Madame de 
Montesquiou never left him, even at night, and cared 
for him with all the solicitude of a mother. They 
rose at seven every morning, and, as soon as prayers 
were over, his daily lessons began. He not only read 
fluently, but even knew a little history and geog- 
raphy. One Abb^ Lanti, almoner of the French 
Legation, came to talk Italian with him, and a valet 
de chambre addressed him only in German. The 
child could already make himself understood in both 
languages, but he disliked extremely to speak the 
latter, finding the pronunciation difficult and harsh." 
Already the heart of the former King of Rome, now 
the Prince of Parma, and awaiting the day when he 
should be merely the Duke of Reichstadt, was con- 
scious of a strife between France, his true fatherland, 
and Austria, the false one they were imposing on 
him I Ah ! what would not Napoleon have given to 
see his son, if only for one instant ! Marie Louise, 
more fortunate, could behold him. But there must 
have been moments when the sight of this child, 
whose father she had abandoned, became a mute 
reproach. 

There was at Vienna, at the time of the Congress, 
an amiable and celebrated old man who was the 
courtier of Marie Louise as he had been of Marie 
Antoinette, and who took a lively interest in the 
great Emperor's son. This octogenarian was Prince 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. G9 



de Ligne, whose life had been so brilliant and who 
still wore with elegance his field-marshal's uniform. 
lie was present at all the entertainments, and, wish- 
ing still to play his old r61e of arbiter of manners 
and good taste, he was naively astonished that he 
produced less effect on women than he had done fifty 
or sixty years before. " My time is over, my world 
is dead," he would say with gentle melancholy. 
"But after all, what merit is there in youth that 
people should lavish such favors on it? . . . It is 
disgusting to see what a brigandage of success it has 
in society." 

The old man consoled himself by playing soldiers 
with the little Napoleon. It was he who said, 
" Honors, ribbons, glory itself, do they give as much 
pleasure as the first doll, the first sailor-suit? The 
child eats four times a day; the hero often cannot 
even take his supper." The first time he saw the 
little Prince he was thus announced: '^ Monseigneur, 
here is the Marshal Prince de Ligne." "Is he a 
marshal?" asked the child. "Yes, IMonseigneur." 
"Is he one of those who deserted my father?" 

One day when he had been much impressed by the 
military parade at the funeral of General Belmotte, 
the child gave his old friend an enthusiastic account 
of the pleasure he felt at the sight of so many fine 
troops. " I will give you a greater satisfaction than 
that before long," answered Prince de Ligne ; " the 
funeral of a field-marshal is the most magnificent 
thing of the sort that can be." The old man kept 



70 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

his word. He died during the Congress, and, between 
two balls, procured the sight of a splendid funeral 
for the sovereigns. Ten thousand troops under arms 
escorted his coffin to the Kahlenberg, the last moun- 
tain of the immense Alpine chain. There he was 
buried in a pavilion he had dedicated to Gaiety and 
the Muses, not far from the chapel where John 
Sobieski went to pray on the day when he delivered 
Vienna. The Prince de Ligne died a Christian. It 
was he who said apropos of some blatant professions 
of infidelity: "All this is very fine when one does 
not hear the bell for the dying. Really, unbelief is 
so much a pretence, that if a man honestly had it, 
I don't see why he shouldn't kill himself at the first 
pain of mind or body. No one understands suffi- 
ciently what human nature would be under the influ- 
ence of positive irreligion. As to the atheists, they 
are living under the protection of religion." 

In the midst of entertainments of all sorts there 
was even found a place for preachers. The fashion- 
able sermons were those of the famous tragic poet, 
Werner, once a Lutheran, but now converted to 
Catholicity and in holy orders. The King of Prussia 
said to him one day, " I don't like people who change 
their religion." "That's why I don't like Luther," 
he responded. The Abbe Werner was a success, 
both as preacher and as poet. His sermons and his 
verses gave equal pleasure. Marie Louise invited 
him to Schoenbrunn, and he read her his tragedy, 
Oun^gonde. 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 71 



But as to the gayer entertainments, they went on 
without Marie Louise sharing in them. For one day, 
January 21, 1815, they were interrupted by a mass 
of expiation, offered as homage to the memory of 
the martyr-king. The sovereigns, all in mourning, 
repaired to the Cathedral of Saint Stephen for this 
solemnity. Who was the man who took the initia- 
tive in the matter? It was the former bishop who 
had said mass in the Champ de Mars on the day of 
the Fete of the Federation ; the minister of the 
Directory who, on the 18th Fructidor, was the im- 
placable enemy of the Royalists ; the grand chamber- 
lain of Napoleon who, on the day of his coronation, 
carried the casket intended to receive the Emperor's 
mantle. 

The memory of the execution of Louis XVI. did 
not afflict the sovereigns very long. The next day 
after this doleful anniversary there was a splendid 
f^te at Schoenbrunn. The monarchs and princes 
came out from Vienna in sleighs which they drove 
themselves. Superb horses drew them, decked with 
splendid plumes and shaking silver bells. A large 
detachment of cavalry opened the march. One im- 
mense sleigh was filled with trumpeters and drum- 
mers who made a prodigious noise. All the ladies 
were wrapped in magnificent furs. The procession 
drove through the courts and gardens of Schoen- 
brunn ; afterwards they entered the palace, and even 
passed through the apartments of Madame de Mon- 
tesquiou and Madame de Brignole. They respected 



72 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS, 

those only of Marie Louise, who, hidden in her 
chamber, listeoed to the blaring of the trumpets. 
After a sumptuous banquet everybody repaired to 
the theatre of the castle, where a German version of 
Cinderella was represented. This sleigh-ride cost 
between five and six hundred thousand francs. 

It was a singular idea to place Marie Louise in the 
midst of this whirlpool of pleasure in which she was 
forbidden to take part. The joyous music which 
resounded for others, but not for her, must have 
brought ironic echoes to her ears. "To me also," 
she might have said, " fetes have been given. I, too, 
have been the object of public curiosity and universal 
enjoyment. I, too, have been flattered by courtiers 
never tired of telling me I possessed all graces and 
all virtues.". 

The former Empress of the French, who was even 
now but twenty-three, had already recovered from 
many illusions and human vanities. Nevertheless 
she still had one ambition : it was to be the Duchess 
of Parma. Her whole mind was bent on this, and 
General Neipperg was careful to cherish her fixed 
idea. He harped upon it continually, and with a 
zeal which made her believe him the only man 
really interested in her fate. In spite of the formal 
stipulations of the treaty of Fontainebleau, made on 
April 11, 1814, the Spanish and French plenipoten- 
tiaries wished to deprive her of the duchies of Parma, 
Piace»za, and Guastalla, and give them to the for- 
mer Queen of Etruria, the daughter of Charles IV. 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 73 

of Spain. Prince Talleyrand, contrary to all equity 
and justice, combated bitterly the indisputable rights 
of Napoleon's wife. On January 19, 1815, he wrote 
f to Louis XVIII. : " As to the arrangements now 
making with reference to Italian affairs, we have 
some reason to hope that the Archduchess Marie 
Louise will be reduced to a considerable annual 
pension. I must tell Your Majesty that I am deeply 
interested in bringing this about, because by this 
means the name of Bonaparte would certainly be 
struck from the list of sovereigns, both now and for 
the future. The Island of Elba is his only for his 
lifetime, and the son of the Archduchess ought not 
to possess an independent state." 

The Emperor of Austria defended his daughter's 
rights but feebly, and Prince Metternich occupied 
himself much more with Napoleon's sister Caroline 
than with Marie Louise, the daughter of his own 
sovereign. The man who showed most interest in 
her was the Czar. Alexander's chief ambition was 
to be thought a chivalrous prince, and he made it 
almost a point of honor to demand the execution 
of the treaty of Fontainebleau : he considered it a 
proof of his magnanimity. As in 1814 he had been 
the courtier of the Empress Josephine at Malmaison, 
so at Schoenbrunn he wished to be that of the Em- 
press Marie Louise. This role of protector to Napo- 
leon's two wives, two dethroned princesses, suited 
his generous nature. The Bourbons gave him no 
great pleasure. He thought them too infatuated 



74 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBED BAYS. 

about the antiquity of their family. Sometimes he 
reproached himself for not having preferred to them, 
if not Napoleon, at least the King of Rome. He 
made a parade of walking arm in arm with Prince 
Eugene de Beauharnais every day. This intimacy 
between the Czar and Napoleon's adopted son exas- 
perated both the old French Royalists and the new 
ones. Talleyrand either considered or pretended to 
consider Alexander a frivolous and superficial person 
who loved a false popularity ; a self-seeking apostle 
of a pretended liberalism. The ex-dignitary of the 
Empire had written to Louis XVIII. on November 
12, 1814: "It is reported that the Emperor Alex- 
ander, in speaking of the Austrian opposition to his 
views, and after bitter complaints against M. de Met- 
ternich, said : ' Austria thinks itself sure of Italy, but 
there is a Napoleon there who could be made useful.' 
I cannot vouch for the truth of this, but the saying 
goes the rounds, and if it be true, it gives an exact 
measure of him who made it." Louis XVIII. replied, 
November 22 : "I credit the speech attributed to the 
Emperor Alexander. It is of the highest impor- 
tance, therefore, that Austria and England should 
take to heart the adage, trivial if you will, but full 
of sense, and specially applicable under existing 
circumstances, Suhlatd causd, tolliter effectusy The 
truth is, Talleyrand should have blushed to be the 
accuser of Napoleon when the Czar, in spite of 
the terrible memories of the Russian campaign, was 
his defender. The more averse he became to Aus- 



DURING THE CONGRESS Ot VIENNA. 75 



tria, whose views were in opposition to his own, 
the more sympathy did Alexander show toward 
Marie Louise. He frequently went unannounced 
to Schoenbrunn, and lavished marks of the sincer- 
est esteem and most exquisite courtesy on the de- 
throned sovereign. 

Marie Louise, feebly defended by her father, was 
reduced to solicit in writing the good offices of the 
other monarchs. She addressed her petitions not 
only to the Czar, but to the King of Prussia. Lord 
Castlereagh presented himself at Schoenbrunn in 
boots and carrying a riding-whip, and only withdrew 
on being admonished that his costume was contrary 
to etiquette. The Minister probably thought that 
an Austrian Archduchess had forfeited her claim to 
polite treatment by the fact of becoming the Em- 
peror Napoleon's wife. One might have said that 
the members of the Congress took a malicious pleas- 
ure in heaping up obstacles to the execution of the 
most solemn promises. The ink was hardly dry on 
the treaty signed at Fontainebleau, April 11, 1814, 
before its most precise stipulations were disregarded. 
No pains were taken even to find pretexts for excus- 
ing these violations of sworn faith. In this affair, as 
in that of Saxony, it must be owned that the sover- 
eigns set a by no means good example to their peo- 
ple. It was they who undermined the bases of both 
throne and altar. 

Prince Talleyrand wrote to Louis XVIIL, Febru- 
ary 15, 1815 : " As to the territorial arrangements in 



76 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Italy, the commission charged with preparing the 
plan have proposed to give Parma, Piacenza, and 
Guastalla, to the Queen of Etruria ; the Legations 
to the Holy See ; the Presides, Piombino, and the 
reversion of Elba to the Grand Duke of Tuscany. 
The Archduchess Marie Louise would have nothing 
but a pension paid by Tuscany and certain fiefs for- 
merly held by the old German Empire and now by 
the Grand Duke of Tuscany, to whom they were 
given as the completion of his indemnity by a decree 
of the Diet. They are situated in Bohemia, and 
yield an income of four hundred thousand florins. 
This scheme was presented through our influence. 
It has the double advantage of not merely diminish- 
ing the number of petty sovereignties in Italy, but, 
what is still more essential, that of sending the son 
of the Archduchess out of the way and depriving 
him of all expectation of ever reigning. Austria 
hesitated for a month, but the Emperor has at last 
decided to yield the duchies to the Queen of Etruria ; 
he says it would not be becoming to keep either for 
himself or any of his family a state belonging to the 
House of Bourbon, with whom it is both his interest 
and his duty to remain on good terms. But, know- 
ing that his daughter is determined to have an inde 
pendent establishment, he has proposed that she shall 
have Lucca, and has charged his Minister to negotiate 
the affair with her." 

Marie Louise was energetic in her refusal of this 
scheme, and Talleyrand added these sentences to his 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 77 



letter: "M. de Metternich presented this counter- 
project and discussed it with me before going to the 
Archduchess. His presumption and his excessive lev- 
ity had prevented his foreseeing that it might not be 
a complete success. But at the first word, the Arch- 
duchess Marie Louise appeared unwilling to content 
herself with Lucca, and even not to care at all for 
that principality. She said it would not be agreeable 
to go there while Napoleon is at Elba. She insists, 
or, rather her advisers insist, on the rights secured to 
her by the treaty of April 11. She does not demand 
Parma, but she will have something equivalent or 
nearly so. I see no way to satisfy her, short of giv- 
ing her the Legations, while securing their reversion 
to the Holy See. But the court of Rome, which 
cannot be reconciled even to the loss of Avignon, 
would make an outcry, and perhaps even resort to 
means of defence compromising to itself. M. de 
Metternich demands three days to consider his course 
of action, and will then give me his answer." 

So then Talleyrand, who continued to wear the 
title of Prince of Benevento, stolen from the Pope, 
would have asked nothing better than to rob Pius 
VII. of the Legations. The obstinacy with which 
Marie Louise asserted her right to Parma prevented 
the success of this combination. But in order to 
obtain this duchy so much desired, she was at last 
wearied into a promise not to take her son there with 
her. The Duchy of Parma was the reward of all the 
bad actions suggested to her bv the Mephistopheles 



T8 ELBA, AND TEE HUNDRED DAYS. 

of diplomacy. " Do you want to be Duchess of Par- 
ma ? " was said to her ; " abandon your husband for- 
ever; swear never to write him a single line. Do 
you want to be Duchess of Parma ? Renounce your 
son also ; you cannot enter your new dominions with 
this child. Leave him at Vienna. You may come to 
see him from time to time; but Parma is as much 
interdicted to him as France. You may be Duchess 
of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla, but only on one 
condition : your son shall not be your heir, but sim- 
ply and absolutely an Austrian subject, or better, a 
prisoner." 

However, the fetes continued. The sovereigns 
cloaked their dissensions under a pretence of amuse- 
ment. Lent put a stop to the balls, but all other 
dissipations went on as usual. On March 3, 1815, 
Talleyrand wrote to Louis XVIII. : " In the embar- 
rassment of not knowing how to pass the time when 
dancing is given up, all sorts of games and amuse- 
ments are resorted to. Among the most fashionable 
are lotteries, to which each person invited contributes 
a prize, so that there are no blanks, and every one 
wins. Day before yesterday Princess Marie Ester- 
hazy gave a lottery of this description, and by an 
excess of civility which has been severely criticised, 
she undertook to arrange matters so that the four 
chief prizes should fall to women particularly distin- 
guished by the Czar and the King of Prussia, both of 
whom were present. The scheme was frustrated by 
young Metternich, who approached the basket when 



DURING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 79 



it was not his turn and drew a ticket which was 
found to entitle him to the most magnificent lot of 
all : it had been brought by the Emperor of Russia. 
The latter was not able to hide his chagrin, and every 
one present was highly amused. Your Majesty will 
remember that the Czar does not attend M. de Met- 
ternich's balls of late nor speak to him when they 
meet elsewhere. The Emperor had nothing but ill- 
luck that evening. A prize which had been brought 
by the young Princess of Auersberg, for whom he 
seems to have a preference, was won by an aide-de- 
camp of the King of Prussia. The Emperor proposed 
an exchange, but the winner refused; the Emperor 
insisted, even to the point of claiming that it had 
been intended for him ; the aide-de-camp replied that 
it was too precious for him to think of parting with 
it. All this delighted everybody, and it was quite 
enough to persuade the Emperor that the soirees at 
Vienna by no means display the good taste which 
marked them when he came." 

On March 5, 1815, the Austrian Empress gave 
an evening party at which tableaux vivants were to 
furnish the entertainment. The principal one repre- 
sented an interview between Maximilian I. and Marie 
of Burgundy. The most charming women of the 
court figured in it, and the spectators were still 
enjoying its unusual excellence when suddenly an 
unwelcome rumor began to circulate. Maximilian, 
Marie of Burgundy, the bishop, the ladies, the chev- 
aliers, the Grand Mistress, — all the personages of the 



80 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

tableau seemed disturbed. On some faces there was 
anger, on others stupefaction. What news was it 
that produced this profound impression of surprise 
and terror? They had just learned that Napoleon 
had quitted Elba, and every one asked himself, 
"Where is he going?" 

No more amusements, no more feasts ! To arms ! 
all Europe was about to cry. To arms all the troops 
of the Coalition ! To arms a million of men against 
a battalion from the Isle of Elba ! Napoleon breaks 
his parole. But the Bourbons, the Allies, had not 
they broken theirs ? Not receiving the subsidy stipu- 
lated by the treaty of Fontainebleau, the Emperor 
was on the verge of famine. The moment was near 
when he would be obliged to disband his brave 
grenadiers, the companions of his glory, his consolers 
in misfortune. His wife and child had been torn 
from him. He was treated like a brigand. The in- 
tention to transport him like a vile criminal to some 
distant island of the Atlantic was openly avowed. 
Had not Talleyrand, the ingrate Talleyrand, written 
to Louis XVni., on October 13, 1814: "There is a 
fixed resolve expressed to remove Bonaparte from 
Elba, but no one seems able to settle on a suitable 
place for him. I propose one of the Azores. It 
would be five hundred leagues from any country." 
Had not Louis XVIII., in his answer of October 21, 
spoken of that " excellent idea of the Azores " f And 
had not Talleyrand, writing again to the King, 
December 7, 1814, said: "We must hasten to get 



DURING TEE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 81 



rid of Murat and the man of Elba " ? Fatal as were 
the consequences of this return from Elba, which led 
to Waterloo, it must be owned that Napoleon had a 
right to defend himself against proceedings contrary 
to justice and morality. He was not merely a gen- 
eral seeking to replace himself at the head of his 
troops, a sovereign anxious to reconquer his sceptre ; 
he was a husband and father bent on regaining pos- 
session of his wife and child. 



VIT. 

THE EETUEN FROM ELBA. 

SATURDAY, February 25, 1815. The Island of 
Elba presents its customary aspect. No one has 
as yet the least notion of the resolution Napoleon is 
about to take. Nothing is talked of at Porto-Fer- 
rajo but the ball to be given in the evening by the 
beautiful Princess Pauline Borghese, the Emperor's 
sister. This fete is very brilliant. All the officers are 
present, as well as the notabilities of the island and 
some visiting foreigners. Napoleon is very gay ; his 
easy and cheerful conversation betrays no preoccupa- 
tion. He stays until a late hour, and then takes 
Generals Bertrand and Drouot home with him to 
tell them his news from Vienna and France. At 
Vienna they have decreed his transportation to the 
Azores. In France the entire army and the majority 
of the people await him as a liberator. He says, 
" We will start to-morrow I " 

Sunday^ February 26. Bertrand and Drouot have 

kept the secret faithfully. The Emperor holds his 

levee as usual, and afterwards is present at the parade 

and at the Mass. Up to four in the afternoon the 

82 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 83 



troops know nothing. The roll of the drums sum- 
mons them to dinner; and when that is over they 
are ordered to repair to the wharf with their arms 
and baggage. At five the signal for embarkation is 
given, and some four hundred of the Guard, with 
their officers, go on board the brig Inconstant, which 
carries twenty-six guns. The remainder of the troops, 
amounting to about seven hundred, embark on the 
schooner Caroline and five other small vessels. The 
wharf is full of people. The inhabitants bid an affec- 
tionate adieu to the soldiers whom they esteem and 
love. Madame M^re and the Princess Pauline are 
at the chateau windows. Napoleon appears and is 
cheered, his countenance meanwhile beaming with joy 
and confidence. He goes on board the Inconstant, 
which is commanded by Captain Chautart with naval 
Lieutenant Taillade as second officer. The flotilla 
gets under sail with a south wind blowing. Night 
falls; by daybreak they hope to have rounded 
Capraja and to be beyond the French and English 
cruisers which operate from that side. But hardly 
have they doubled the Elban cape of Saint Andr^ 
when the wind goes down and the sea becomes 
absolutely calm. 

Monday, February 27. Day breaks ; they have 
made only six leagues, and are in full sight of the 
cruisers, between Capraja and Elba, chained, as it 
were, upon a moveless sea. Some of the naval officers 
advise a return to Porto-Ferrajo. But the wind rises 
again, and Napoleon orders the voyage to be con- 



84 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

tinued. At four in the afternoon they are off the 
heights of Leghorn. One frigate is sighted five 
leagues to leeward ; another is close to Corsica ; and 
in the distance is seen a man-of-war approaching the 
flotilla with the wind astern. It is the ZSphir^ a 
vessel of the French royal navy, commanded by Cap- 
tain Andrieux. What is to be done ? Shall they run 
up the tricolor and try to induce this officer to declare 
for Napoleon. The Emperor will not risk an impru- 
dence which may not succeed. He orders the grena- 
diers to take off their foraging caps and hide under 
the bridge. At six in the evening the ZSphir and 
the Inconstant are near enough to speak, and a dia- 
logue opens between Lieutenant Taillade and Captain 
Andrieux, who know and salute each other. The 
former takes his speaking-trumpet : — 

"Where are you bound?" 

" To Leghorn. And you ? " ' 

"To Genoa. Have you any commissions I can 
execute there ? " 

" Thanks, not any. How is the Emperor ? " 

" Very well." 

" So much the better.'^ 

The conversation ends; the two vessels continue 
their opposite routes and lose sight of each other. 
The officer of the royal navy does not suspect that 
CsDsar and his fortunes have just passed by. The 
other vessels which had alarmed the imperial flotilla 
have disappeared from the horizon. 

Tuesday^ February 28. During the night the wind 



rriE RETURN FROM ELBA. 85 

has continued to freshen. At dawn a vessel of sev- 
enty-four guns is seen in the distance which appears 
to be going to Saint-Florent or Sardinia; but it 
soon becomes evident that it will not trouble it- 
self about the Emperor's flotilla. They have been 
thirty-six hours at sea, and the soldiers do not yet 
know whither they are bound. All at once, Lieuten- 
ant Taillade notices that Captain Chautart has turned 
the vessel's head away from France. " Gentlemen," 
he says to the officers on the bridge, " are we going 
to Spain or to Africa?" Some one reports this to 
Napoleon, and he summons Taillade. 

" Where are we?" he says. 

" Sire, we are headed for Africa." 

" I don't desire to go there. Take me to France." 

"Your Majesty shall be there before noon to- 
morrow." 

Then the Emperor, turning toward the soldiers of 
the Old Guard : — 

" Yes, grenadiers, we are going to France, to 
Paris." And the soldiers break into enthusiastic 
cries. 

Napoleon makes of the deck of the Inconstant both 
his promenade and his cabinet. While the wind blows 
and they near the coast of France, he dictates two 
proclamations, one to the people, the other to tlie 
army. " Frenchmen, in my exile I have heard your 
lamentations and your prayers ; I have crossed the 
seas in the midst of perils of every kind; I arrive 
among you to resume my rights, which are also yours. 



86 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

I will forget forever all that individuals may have 
said, done, or written since the taking of Paris, be- 
cause there are events which are too powerful for 
human nature. Frenchmen, there is no nation, how- 
ever insignificant, which has not had the right, and 
has not attempted, to free itself from the dishonor of 
obeying a prince imposed on it by a momentarily 
victorious enemy. When Charles VII. re-entered 
Paris and overthrew the ephemeral power of Henry 
VI., he recognized that he owed his throne to the 
valor of his soldiers and not to the Prince Regent of 
England. And it is to you alone, and to the brave 
men of the army, that I glory and will ever glory 
in owing all." 

The proclamation to the army is more ardent still : 
" Soldiers, we have not been vanquished. Two men, 
risen from our ranks, betrayed our laurels, their 
country, their prince, their benefactor. Shall those 
whom we have seen for twenty years scouring 
Europe to make enemies for us; those who have 
passed their lives fighting against us in foreign 
armies and cursing our beautiful France ; shall they 
command and chain our eagles, they who never 
could endure their glance ? Shall we suffer them 
to inherit the fruit of our labors, to seize our honors 
and our goods and calumniate our glory? Should 
their reign endure, all would be lost, even the sou- 
venir of our most memorable days." 

Then, in a martial voice which grew more ani- 
mated from phrase to phrase. Napoleon thus ended 
his dictation, sonorous as the note of a clarion : — 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 87 



" Come, range yourselves beneath the banners of 
your chief. His existence is bound up with yours ; 
his rights are youi's and those of the people; his 
interest, his honor, his glory, are nothing but your 
interest, your honor, your glory. Our onset and our 
victory will march side by side ; the eagle with the 
national colors will fly from steeple to steeple, till it 
reaches the towers of Notre Dame. Then you can 
show your scars with honor ; then you can boast of 
what you have done; you will be the liberators of 
the fatherland." 

As soon as the dictation is finished, the subaltern 
officers begin to transcribe it with so much zeal that 
five hundred copies are ready before they land. 

Wednesday^ March 1. In the morning they behold 
with joy the coast of France. At noon they sight 
Antibes and the Islands of Sainte-Marguerite ; at three 
they anchor in the Bay of Juan. The guns of the 
Inconstant fire salvos of rejoicing, and every soldier 
dons his tricolored cockade. The boats are let down, 
and the landing is completed by five in the afternoon. 
They bivouac in an olive plantation near the shore. 
"Happy omen! " cries Napoleon; "the olive is the em- 
blem of peace." He plucks some violets; then a table 
and chair are brought, and he sits down and spreads 
out his maps. He must choose between two roads, 
— that of lower Provence, which is easy, but where 
he cannot rely on the favorable attitude of the people, 
and that of Dauphiny, which bristles with rocks and 
mountains covered with ice and snow, but where they 



88 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

will encounter sympathetic sentiments. This route, 
too, will recall the passage of the Alps at the time of 
the Marengo campaign, and the Emperor settles on it. 
The moon rises. At eleven he leaves the bivouac 
and goes toward Cannes, whither he had sent Gen- 
eral Cambronne with a vanguard to buy mules and 
horses. He passes through Cannes at midnight, and 
continues his route, leaving Antibes on the right. 

Thursday^ March 2. The Emperor has marched 
all night. At daybreak they wind round Grasse, and 
take up position on a plateau which overlooks the 
town. Some of the inhabitants bring provisions, 
which the Emperor accepts and pays for. After rest- 
ing two hours, he sets off again in the direction of 
Sernon. At Grasse he abandons the four field-pieces 
which composed his artillery, because they would be 
impediments on the almost impassable roads they are 
about to traverse. A hundred men under Cambronne 
form the vanguard ; the Emperor is in the centre, with 
the battalion of the Old Guard, which escorts the 
treasure and the ammunition and stores ; the Corsican 
battalion form the rear-guard. The way is difficult 
and the cold severe. They march in single file along 
roads bordering precipices, down which several mules, 
one of them laden with gold, plunge and cannot be 
rescued. Napoleon, obliged to dismount in order to 
keep warm, more than once stumbles in the snow. 
Once he rests for a moment in a cabin where there 
is an old woman, and draws near her brushwood 
fire. 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 89 



"Have you any news from Paris?" he says to 
the old peasant. " Do you know what the King is 
doing ? " 

" The King ? " answers the old woman. "You mean 
to say the Emperor. He is always down yonder." 

So the peasant has heard not a word of all that has 
happened in the last year. O vanity of glory ! Napo- 
leon looks pensively at General Drouot. "Well, 
Drouot," he says, "what is the good of troubling 
the world in order to fill it with our name?" 

In the evening he arrives at Sernon, on the con- 
fines of the Department of the Lower Alps. He and 
his troops have marched twenty leagues that day. 
His soldiers are worn out with fatigue, but their 
enthusiasm revives them. 

Friday., March 3. The Emperor, who passed the 
night at Sernon, resumes his march in the morning. 
The cold remains bitter, and the roads, covered with 
snow, continually ascend. The Polish lancers, who 
have not yet been able to obtain horses, carry their 
equipments on their shoulders. Nobody complains, 
and they cover almost as many miles as on the previ- 
ous day. At night they sleep at Bareme, ten leagues 
from the banks of the Durance. 

Saturday., March 4. They make an early start, 
and at one in the afternoon the Emperor on horse- 
back enters Dijon, where he breakfasts. At half-past 
three he gets into the saddle again, and departs, 
leaving General Drouot, with four grenadiers, to look 
after the printing of his proclamations, which until 



90 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

now have circulated in manuscript. At nine he 
reaches Malijai, where he sleeps. 

Sunday., March 5. They turn towards Sisteron, 
where a great obstacle is to be dreaded. The for- 
tress of this town is separated from the Durance by a 
bridge. What is to be done if it is defended, or its 
single arch blown up ? But at two in the morning, 
General Cambronne and the advance guard reach 
the bridge and seize it unresisted. Napoleon enters 
Sisteron without difficulty, breakfasts, and receives 
the sub-prefect and the mayor, who come to pay 
their compliments, while the people give him an 
enthusiastic welcome. As his Arabian is too tired 
to go any further, he takes another horse, pursues 
his route, and sleeps that night at Gap. 

Monday., March 6. The Emperor spent the night 
at Gap, with only ten cavalrymen and forty grena- 
diers. His advance guard had started several hours 
before him, for the purpose of exploring the danger- 
ous defile of Saint-Bonnet, which, on leaving Gap, 
crosses a high mountain at the pass of Saint-Guignes, 
and connects the valley of the Durance with that of 
the Drac, one of the affluents of the Is^re. Napoleon 
waits for the rear-guard, and leaves Gap with it at 
two in the afternoon. The whole population of the 
town turns out to see him go. They pass the defile 
without difficulty. At Saint-Bonnet, the inhabitants, 
seeing how few troops he has, tremble on his account; 
they beg him to sound the tocsin, and summon all 
able-bodied men in the surrounding villages for an 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 91 



escort. "No," says he; "your sentiments prove to 
me that I did not deceive myself. They guarantee 
the sentiments of my soldiery. Those whom I meet 
will range themselves on my side. The more of 
them there are, the more certainly will my success be 
assured. Stay quietly at home." Napoleon sleeps 
at Corps, a town on the boundary of the Department 
of the Isere, while his advance guard march all night 
toward the village of La Mure. 

Tuesday, March 7. The solemn moment is ap- 
proaching. As yet the Emperor has met no troops 
to bar his passage. The white flag and the tricolor 
have not found themselves face to face. Not a 
soldier belonging to the armies of Louis XVIII. has 
joined the little phalanx from the Island of Elba. 
No one can assure the Emperor that they will not 
fire on him. Even among the Bonapartists there are 
a good many officers who are unwilling to violate 
the oath so recently taken to the King. A terrible 
conflict goes on in their hearts between the memory 
of past glories and the sentiment of present disci- 
pline. If an officer orders a volley, will the soldiers 
obey? The whole question is there. Napoleon, 
daring as he is, and accustomed to risk all for all, 
has never, in his whole adventurous career, engaged 
in a more doubtful game. A little longer, and what 
will he be? A triumphant Csesar, saluted by his 
legionaries, or a corpse riddled with balls? God 
alone knows. 

In both camps the night of March 6-7 has been 



92 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

full of anxiety. All the troops garrisoned in Dau- 
phin}^ and the part of Savoy owned by France — that 
is to say, the 7th and 11th of the Line, the 3d Engi- 
neers, the 4th Artillery, and the 4th Hussars — are 
concentrated at Grenoble in order to arrest there him 
whom the Royalists call the Brigand of Elba. Toward 
midnight a battalion of the 5th of the Line meets 
the Polish lancers of the imperial advance guard at 
La Mure. Both expect a collision ; but Lessard, the 
head of the battalion as well as the commander of 
the royal advance guard, orders his troops to turn 
back to Laffrey, a little village two leagues from La 
Mure and six from Grenoble, which it enters at five 
in the morning. On his part, Cambronne, commander 
of the imperial advance guard, who arrived at La 
Mure in the night, thinks it prudent to lead his men 
back to this side of Ponthaut, where he occupies the 
bridge. 

At dawn Commandant Lessard finds himself at 
Laffrey, with a battalion of the 5th Line and a num- 
ber of engineers and artillery-men, in a position be- 
tween lakes and mountains very easy to defend. 

At nine Napoleon is at Ponthaut, preparing for his 
onward march, with that imperturbable calm which 
he has never lost in the greatest crises and most for- 
midable perils of his stormy destiny. He divides his 
little column into three bodies. Colonel Mallet takes 
command of the three companies forming the advance 
guard. The Polish lancers, under Colonel Jer- 
manwski, take the right side of the road. The 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 93 



officers who are without troops take the left, under 
Major Pacconi. Napoleon, in the midst of the ad- 
vance guard, on horseback, wearing the famous gray 
overcoat and the broad ribbon of the Legion of Honor, 
and attended by Generals Bertrand, Drouot, and 
Cambronne, goes to meet the Royalist troops, Avho 
have remained in position before Laffrey, between 
the mountains and the lakes. 

About one o'clock in the afternoon some Polish 
lancers, who had been sent ahead to see how the 
land lay, try to open a parley with the battalion of 
the 6th Line. Commandant Lessard assures them 
that if they renew the attempt he will fire on them. 

Napoleon draws near. He descends from his 
horse. "Tell the soldiers to put their weapons under 
their left arms, points down," said he, to Colonel Mal- 
let. "Sire," responds the Colonel, "is it not dan- 
gerous to act thus in presence of troops whose 
sentiments we do not know, and whose first fire 
may be so fatal ? " 

The Emperor repeats : " Mallet, tell them to put 
the weapons under their arms." The order is ex- 
ecuted. At the sides of the road mute and attentive 
peasants watch the scene about to take place. The 
two battalions are not more than a pistol-shot apart. 
The silence is absolute: profound emotion almost 
stops the breath. 

Napoleon goes forward all alone. His legendary 
profile defines itself against the sky. "Present 
arms ! " commands the head of the royal battaUon. 



94 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

The guns are levelled at the man of Austerlitz, who, 
impassible, continues slowly to advance. Arrived 
in front of the battalion, he raises his hand to his 
cap and salutes ; then, in a strong voice : — 

" Soldiers of the 5th," he cries, " do you recognize 
me?" 

"Yes, yes," replies some one. 

Then he adds: "Soldiers, behold your general; 
behold your Emperor. Let any one of you who 
wishes to kill him, fire ! " 

At these words the soldiers, instead of firing, throw 
themselves down on their knees. They kiss Na- 
poleon's hands ; they call him father ; they utter 
frenzied acclamations. Their shakos wave from the 
tips of their sabres and bayonets. "Everything is 
over," said Napoleon to Bertrand and Drouot. " In 
ten days we shall be at the Tuileries." 

The soldiers trampled under foot their white 
cockades, and put in their place the tricolored ones, 
which they had kept at the bottom of their knap- 
sacks. Before taking up the march again, the Em- 
peror has them drawn up in battle array, and addresses 
this allocution to them : " Soldiers, I come with a 
handful of brave men because I count on the people 
and on you. The throne of the Bourbons is illegiti- 
mate, because it was not erected by the nation ; it is 
contrary to the national will, since it is contrary to 
the interest of our country, and only exists for the 
profit of certain families. Ask your fathers ; ques- 
tion all these people who come here from the neigh- 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA, 95 



borhood ; you will learn the real state of affairs from 
their lips. They are threatened with a return of the 
tithes, the privileges and rights of feudal times, and 
all the other abuses from which your successes had 
delivered them." At this moment a peasant cries 
out, " Yes, Sire ; they wish to attach us to the soil. 
You come, like the angel of the Lord, to deliver us." 

The troops, having fraternized, march on toward 
Grenoble, the Emperor at their head. The throngs 
of peasantry constantly grow larger, and join their 
shouts to those of the soldiery. They reach Vizille, 
where the enthusiasm of the inhabitants is excessive. 
" It is we," said they, " who first dared to reclaim 
the rights of man. This is the cradle of the Kevolu- 
tion ; and it is here that French liberty revives again 
and France recovers her independence and her 
honor." 

Between Vizille and Grenoble they see a regiment 
of infantry coming toward them. It is the 7th of the 
Line, commanded by Colonel de Labddoyere. He has 
left Grenoble to meet Napoleon. He has had the 
eagle of the regiment taken out of a chest, and, bran- 
dishing his sword and crying, "Long live the Em- 
peror ! " he had said, " Soldiers ! Those who love me 
follow me ! " The soldiers followed him. Napoleon 
and the Colonel get off their horses at the same 
moment and throw themselves into each other's arms. 
" Colonel," says the Emperor, " it is you who replace 
me on the throne." 

The reunited troops, amounting to nearly three 



96 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

thousand men, march to Grenoble escorted by several 
thousand peasants. The Royalist authorities have 
closed the gates of the city. The ramparts are cov- 
ered by the 3d regiment of Engineers, consisting of 
two thousand sappers, veterans whose bodies are fur- 
rowed with glorious wounds ; by the 4th Artillery, of 
which the Emperor had been made captain twenty- 
five years before ; by two battalions of the 5th of the 
Line ; by the 11th of the Line and the Hussars of the 
4th. Advancing before the ramparts, Lab^doyere, 
speaking in profound darkness, says : " Soldiers, it 
is I, Labedoy^re, Colonel of the 7th. We bring you 
Napoleon. He is yonder. It is for you to receive 
him and to repeat with us the rallying cry of the for- 
mer conquerors of Europe : Live the Emperor ! " The 
troops on the ramparts respond by an immense shout. 
Furious at finding the gates of the city closed, they 
try to force them with axes, while, on the outside, 
bands of peasants are busy in breaking them down. 
Under this double strain they finally give way. It 
is nine in the evening. Two human streams flow 
ag-ainst each other. Three thousand soldiers and 
several thousand peasants who surround Napoleon 
crowd upon the drawbridge at the risk of stifling 
their sovereign in order to enter with him into the 
city. Five thousand soldiers of the garrison and the 
greater part of the inhabitants of Grenoble precipi- 
tate themselves toward the same point to meet the 
Emperor. Flambeaux and torches illuminate this 
scene, noisy with confusion and enthusiasm. It is 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 97 

with great difficulty that Napoleon forces a passage 
through the delirious crowd and reaches an inn, the 
Three Dauphins, where he spends the night. 

Wed7iesda?/, March 8. The Emperor stays all day 
at Grenoble. He governs there; he reigns. After 
receiving the city authorities he reviews the troops of 
the garrison. He ascertains with joy that in the twin- 
kling of an eye these ten thousand men have resumed 
their tricolored cockades — cockades old and soiled; 
for when they were obliged to take them off, they 
had hidden them at the bottom of their knapsacks, 
hoping to put them on again some day. Some of the 
men, as they pass the Emperor, say : " This is the 
same we wore at Austerlitz." ''This," say others, 
" we had at Marengo." 

After the review Napoleon Avrites to Marie Louise, 
announcing his happy arrival at Grenoble and beg- 
ging her to rejoin him with his son at Paris, where 
he expects soon to be. This letter is sent to Gen- 
eral de Bubna, commander of the Austrian troops 
at Turin, who is requested to transmit it to the 
Empress. 

Thursday^ March 9. The Emperor, who slept at 
Grenoble, leaves the city at noon with a small army 
of six thousand men, and goes toward Lyons. His 
march is a long ovation. As he is fatigued, he travels 
slowly in an open carriage, surrounded by a crowd of 
peasants singing patriotic songs. " Ah ! " says he, 
" I find here the sentiments which twenty years ago 
made me salute France as ' the great nation.' Yes, 



98 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

you are still the great nation. You will always be 
so." In the evening he sleeps at Bourgoin. 

Friday^ March 10. At Lyons the Royalists despair 
of arresting the Emperor's progress. The garrison, 
composed of the 13th Dragoons, and the 2Uth and 
24th of the Line, will not remain faithful to the 
King in spite of the efforts of the Count of Artois 
and the Duke of Orleans. They had come from 
Paris to organize resistance, but they are obliged to 
take to flight. Marshal Macdonald has imitated 
them. The authorities have barricaded the bridge at 
the suburb of the Guilloti^re with pieces of wood, 
and drawn up troops upon the wharf. But the mo- 
ment that they learn of the arrival of the Emperor, 
the soldiers destroy the barricade and throw the re- 
mains of it into the Rhone. Napoleon makes a 
triumphal entry into Lyons, where he installs himself 
in the Archbishop's palace. 

Saturday^ March 11. The Emperor reviews the 
troops in the Place Bellecour, and, directly after- 
wards, a division commanded by General Brayer sets 
off on its march toward Paris. Napoleon writes 
another letter to Marie Louise, announcing that he 
will be in his capital on March 20, the birthday of 
the King of Rome. 

Sunday^ March 12. The Emperor spends the day 
at Lyons in organizing his government. Satisfied 
with the dispositions of its inhabitants, he thanks 
them in these words : " Lyonnese, I love you." 

Monday^ March 13. He quits Lyons and sleeps at 
M^con. 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 99 



Tuesday^ March 14. He continues his route and 
goes to rest at Chalons-sur-Sa6ne. The same day, 
at Lons-le-Saulnier, Marshal Ney, who was the sole 
hope of the Roj^alists, and who had, they say, promised 
Louis XVIII. to bring back Napoleon in an iron 
cage, declares for the imperial cause and makes a 
proclamation to his soldiers which opens thus : " The 
cause of the Bourbons is lost forever." 

Wednesday^ March 15. The Emperor sleeps at 
Autun. 

Thursday^ March 16. He rests at Avallon. On 
the same day Louis XVIII. holds a royal stance at 
Paris. He says to the Chambers : " I have once more 
seen my country ; I have reconciled it with foreign 
Powers who will, I beg you to believe it, remain 
faithful to the treaties which have given us peace ; 
I have labored for the welfare of my people ; I have 
received, I receive every day, the most touching 
proofs of their affection. At sixty years, can I more 
worthily terminate my career than by dying in their 
defence ? I fear nothing, then, for myself, but I fear 
for France. He who is coming to kindle among you 
the torch of civil war, brings also the scourge of 
foreign war ; he comes to put our country once again 
beneath his iron yoke ; he comes, in fine, to destroy 
that constitutional charter wliich I gave you, that 
charter which is my noblest claim to the esteem of 
posterity, that charter which all Frenchmen cherish, 
and which I swear to uphold. Let us rally about it 
then." While the King is yet speaking, a passing 



100 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



cloud wraps the hall in profound gloom. All eyes 
turn toward the ceiling to discover the cause of this 
sudden night. The emotion of the Royalists reaches 
its height, and, weeping, they cry: ''Long live the 
King ! " 

Friday^ March 17. Napoleon continues his march 
without obstacles, and passes the night at Auxerre. 

Saturday, March 18. In this city he is rejoined 
by Marshal Ney. " Embrace me, jny dear Marshal," 
he says to him. " There is no need to excuse your- 
self. Your excuse, like mine, is the course of events 
which have been stronger than men. Let us speak 
no more about the past, but think only how to re- 
trieve the future." 

The infantry embarks on the Yonne in time to 
reach Fontainebleau in the morning of March 20. 
The Emperor enters an open carriage with Bertrand 
and Drouot and drives thither. 

Palm Sunday, March 19. At Paris Louis XVIII. 
has not yet announced his determination to take to 
flight. As usual, he assists at Mass in the chapel of 
the Tuileries. During the day he reviews his military 
household in the Champ-de-Mars. Between eleven 
o'clock and midnight, some travelling carriages are 
brought into the courtyard of the Tuileries and stop 
at the foot of the stairway of the Pavilion of Flora. 
Louis XVIII. comes down, and begins another exile. 
The weather is horrid and the night frightful. The 
rain falls in torrents ; the wind, blowing in gusts, ex- 
tinguishes the lights, which look like funeral torches. 



THE liETUBN FROM ELBA. 101 

During the day Napoleon has continued his march. 

Monday -i7i- Holy -We ek^ March 20. At four in the 
morning the Emperor arrives at Fontainebleau, where, 
exactly eleven months before, he had taken his mem- 
orable farewell of the Imperial Guard in the court of 
the Cheval-Blanc. Seeing this court once more ; 
climbing the steps of the great stone stairway he 
had descended on April 20, 1814, without knowing 
whether he would ever remount them ; entering the 
chamber where he had vainly sought in suicide a 
refuge against his mental sufferings, he experienced 
a sentiment of profound joy, and said to himself, 
" This is my revenge." At seven in the morning he 
receives from M. de Lavalette, who has just resumed 
the direction of the post-office at Paris, a despatch 
announcing the departure of Louis XVIII. He re- 
solves to spend the night at the Tuileries to celebrate 
the birthday of the King of Rome. 

What is happening at Paris? On awaking, the 
people do not yet know that Louis XVIII. has fled. 
From earl}' morning crowds flock toward the Tuile- 
ries. A detachment of the National Guard is still 
at the palace, and the white flag is floating on the 
dome of the Pavilion of the Horloge. Some liveried 
domestics are in sight, but no body-guards. Soon 
the news of the King's flight is bruited about, and 
as the gratings of the palace are closed, some Bona- 
partists try to force them, but do not succeed. 

At Saint-Denis the half-pay officers, who are warm 
partisans of the Emperor, assemble under the orders 



102 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAY&. 

of General Exelmans. They persuade several de- 
tachments of infantry, a battery of artillery, and a 
squadron of cuirassiers to join them, and putting on 
the tricolored cockade, they march toward Paris. 
At two in the afternoon there they are, debouching 
into the Place of the Carrousel. At first the Na- 
tional Guard refuse to open the Tuileries to them, 
but they insist, and General Exelmans says that 
since the King is in flight and the entire army has 
declared for the Emperor, resistance will be useless. 
The gratings are opened, and the white flag on the 
Pavilion of the Horloge is replaced by the tricolor. 
General Exelmans and his soldiery, masters of the 
Palace of the Tuileries, wait there for Napoleon. 

Almost at the same moment the Emperor at Fon- 
tainebleau gets into a carriage with Caulaincourt, 
Drouot, and Bertrand, and drives toward the capital, 
retarded somewhat by troops coming to rejoin him, 
and crowds of people who greet him with cries of 

joy- 

At Paris the day is spent in waiting. Evening 
comes, and as the weather is bad, the crowds dimin- 
ish. People go home to dinner. Everybody says : 
"It is late, and the Emperor will not come until 
to-morrow." However, the high officials of the 
Empire and their wives have come to the Tuileries, 
the men in uniform, and the ladies in full dress. 
The palace is illuminated as if for a fete. The lilies 
are torn from the tapestries and the bees reappear. 
Queen Hortense, King Joseph's wife, and the maids 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 103 



of honor of Marie Louise are in the salons. Toward 
nine o'clock they hear a great noise : it is the Em- 
peror coming. Entering Paris by the Gate of Italy, 
he has followed the exterior boulevards as far as the 
Invalides, crossed the Pont de la Concorde, and gone 
along the quay to the first gate of the Tuileries. 
Frenzied acclamations resound on all sides, as his 
carriage, surrounded by cavalry officers, enters the 
courtyard of the palace. Inebriated with joy, mad 
with enthusiasm, the half-pay officers fling themselves 
before their sovereign, tear him from his carriage and 
bear him on their arms, a living shield; kissing his 
hands, embracing the skirts of his gray overcoat, 
they drag him thus, in their delirium, to the foot of 
the great stairway. It is only then that his feet are 
permitted to touch the ground. The shouts redouble 
until the very roof of the palace trembles with them. 
Men press upon, they stifle each other. Two currents 
meet on the stairway: one that descends to meet 
Napoleon ; one that tries to ascend the steps. The 
Duke of Vicenza, who is behind the Emperor with 
Bertrand and Drouot, recognizes Lavalette in the 
crowd coming down from the first landing. "In 
God's name," he cries, " get in front of him so that 
he can proceed." Lavalette puts himself face to 
face with Napoleon and going upstairs backward, one 
step ahead of his master, succeeds in opening a 
passage for him. "What! it is you," he says, "it 
is you ! it is you at last ! " Tlie Emperor sheds 
tears of joy. He re-enters his chamber ; last night 



104 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Louis XVIII. had occupied it. The prediction is 
accomplished. In twenty days, from the Bay of 
Juan, the imperial eagle has flown, without once 
stopping, from steeple to steeple, even to the towers 
of Notre Dame, even to the dome of the Palace of 
the Tuileries. 

The next day, March 21, at one in the afternoon, 
Napoleon reviews in the Carrousel the soldiers who 
were at Paris, and the battalion from Elba, which 
had just accomplished a march that, for rapidity, has 
perhaps no parallel in history. Causing the officers 
of this battalion to approach, and showing them to 
the troops, the Emperor exclaims : " Soldiers, behold 
the officers who accompanied me in my misfortunes ; 
all of them are my friends, all are dear to my heart. 
Each time that I saw them I seemed to see the army 
itself. Their presence recalled to me those immortal 
days which will never be effaced from your memories 
nor from mine. In loving them I love you. They 
have brought back to you, untouched and forever 
glorious, those eagles which for one moment treason 
had covered with a funeral pall. Soldiers, I give 
them back to you. Swear to me that you will fol- 
low them wherever the interests of our country call 
them." The soldiers answered, "We swear it." 
On the same day, the organizer of the republican 
armies, the famous Conventionist Carnot, is named 
Count of the Empire and Minister of the Interior. 

On March 25, Napoleon again reviews the troops 
in the courtyard of the Tuileries. " How mad they 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 105 

were," says he to them, " and how little they knew 
the nation, who believed that Frenchmen would ever 
consent to receive a prince from the same hands that 
had laid waste our territory and, aided by treachery, 
for a moment touched our laurels ! The Bourbon 
throne is as incompatible with the new interests of 
the French people as it is with their glory. Soldiers, 
I wish to give, in your presence, a special testimony 
of my satisfaction with the brave garrison of Grenoble. 
I know well that every French regiment would have 
done as they did. So, too, I must avow my gratitude 
to that courageous battalion of the 5th, and that 
company of miners who, placed in a defile, came as 
one man to surround their Emperor who had offered 
himself to their fire. They have merited well from 
the French nation, and from me and you." Inter- 
rupted by huzzas. Napoleon added only these words : 
" Soldiers, you will be always faithful to the great 
cause of the people, to the honor of France and to 
your Emperor." 

The next day, which was Easter Sunday, March 26, 
Marshal Ney gave a dinner at Lille to the generals 
and superior officers of the garrison. The following 
toasts were drunk. By the Marshal : " To the Em- 
peror Napoleon, our august sovereign ! May this 
name, cherished by the whole army, be forever the 
rallying cry of all good Frenchmen ! Live the Em- 
peror ! " By General Count d'Erlon : "To Her 
Majesty, the Empress ! On her return to us may she 
find in the vivacity of our joy, the expression of the 



106 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



love borne towards her by the French, and the regrets 
caused by her absence ! " By General Duhesme : " To 
the Prince Imperial! May this august child, the 
source of so many hopes, long flourish under the 
guidance of his father, and inherit his great qualities 
for the welfare and the glory of France ! " 

On March 81, the Emperor visited the imperial 
institution of Saint-Denis, devoted to the education 
of the daughters of members of the Legion of Honor. 
He arrived unannounced. " It was a touching spec- 
tacle," said the Moniteur^ " to see the Emperor sur-* 
rounded by five hundred young girls whose fathers 
had either died on the field of battle or come back 
from it with honorable wounds. One understands 
the sentiment which made His Majesty say to the 
superintendent, ' You did not expect me ; but you 
might have known that my first visit would be to my 
imperial House of Saint-Denis.' " 

At Paris, on Sunday, April 2, there was a grand 
military fete in the Champ-de-Mars, given by the 
Imperial Guard to the Parisian National Guard and 
the soldiers of the garrison. 

About two in the afternoon nearly fifteen thousand 
men of all equipments dined in the open air on the 
Champ-de-Mars, the slopes of which were filled by an 
immense crowd. The bands played and the guests 
sang. The cry " Long live the Emperor ! " broke in 
constantly like a refrain. In the galleries and salons 
of the Military School, the generals and other officers 
likewise sat down to a generous banquet. The bust 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 107 



of Napoleon was surrounded by emblems of victory. 
At dessert, when all present had drunk to the health 
of the Emperor, the Empress, and the Prince Imperial, 
and discharges of artillery were responding to the 
toasts, the guests, animated by a sudden and sponta- 
neous movement, drew their swords from their scab- 
bards, and waving them in air, renewed the oath to 
conquer or to die for their Emperor and their country. 
" To the column ! to the column I " cried a voice, and 
the heroic crowd took up the cry. In the twinkling 
of an eye an immense procession of officers, soldiers, 
national guards and citizens were formed, and the 
bands of the Imperial Guard preceded them. An offi- 
cer carried Napoleon's bust. They turned toward the 
Tuileries, and when they reached the garden, they 
stopped under the Emperor's cabinet windows and 
hurrahed for him until he appeared and thanked 
them. Then, going to the Place Vend6me, they 
hoisted the bust to the summit of the column, and 
encircled the pedestal with a garland of lights. The 
windows of every house in the square were at once 
illuminated as if by enchantment. 

In his book on Lucien Bonaparte, Colonel Jung 
says : " The movement of 1815 was admirable for its 
ardor and patriotism. There is nothing like it in the 
history of France, except that of 1792, at the time 
of the departure of the volunteers for the frontier." 
And yet, despite so many testimonies of enthusiasm, 
Napoleon was melancholy. When the first intoxica- 
tion of success was over, he doubted his good luck. 



108 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

He was ill at ease in liis new role as a constitutional 
monarch. What suited him was not liberty, but glory. 
He was like a lion who has let his claws be cut and 
his teeth pulled out, and to whom nothing but his 
mane is left. In his bureau drawers he found protes- 
tations of devotion addressed to Louis XVHI. by the 
very men who were now most vociferous in their cries 
of " Live the Emperor I " 

On March 8, Marshal Soult had written in an order 
of the day: "Bonaparte misapprehends us so much 
as to believe that we could abandon a legitimate and 
beloved sovereign in order to share the fate of a mere 
adventurer. He believes it, the madman ! His last 

,' act of lunacy serves to make him known." And now 
Marshal Soult was figuring in the first rank of the 
Emperor's courtiers. 

In the Debats of March 19, Benjamin Constant had 
published an article in which these words occur: 
" He reappears at the extremity of our frontier, this 
man reddened with our blood and but lately followed 
by our unanimous maledictions. . . . Parisians, I have 
seen that liberty is possible under the monarchy ; I 
have seen the King unite himself to the nation. I will 
not drag myself, a wretched renegade, from one power 
to another ; I will not cover infamy by sophisms, nor 

"' stammer profane words in order to buy a shameful 
life." And now Benjamin Constant has accepted an 
appointment as Councillor of State from the Em- 
peror. Napoleon is indulgent to all men who change 
their opinions ; he has himself been by turns a Royal- 



THE RETURN FROM ELBA. 109 

ist, a Republican, an Imperialist, that is to say, an 
Emperor. Recantations and apostasies may alllict 
him, but his knowledge of the human heart is too 
profound for him to be astonished by them. It seems 
to him that France is an actress who, at every instant, 
changes her costume and lier part without remorse. 
There is not time enough to tear off either the bees 
or the lilies from the escutcheons. 

The functionaries who have just been resuming the 
tricolored cockade with so much zeal have probably 
taken care to hide the white one in a safe place, for 
sooner or later it is like enough to reappear. Oaths 
are taken onl}^ from the tip of the tongue ; it is a 
simple formality. Napoleon knows all that ; he knows 
also that Success is the god of France, and he sa^^s 
to himself anxiously, " Shall I succeed ? " This im- 
mense Palace of the Tuileries, where he finds neither 
wife nor son, has lost its prestige for him, and is 
" only a sad and melancholy abode." In the depths 
of his soul he compares the 20th of March, 1815, 
with the 20th of March, 1811. The son's cradle has 
not been more solid than the father's throne. The 
child is exiled and proscribed. Now that the Pope 
has triumphantly re-entered the Eternal City, the title 
of " King of Rome " has an ironic ring. It was an 
infant's toy, this royalty of a day, and behold, the toy 
is broken. Napoleon may still be Emperor, but what 
has become of the crown of Italy, that iron crown, of 
which he had said so proudly under tlie vaulted roof 
of Milan cathedral : " God has given it to me ; woe 



110 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

to him who touches it ! " And the pompous title of 
Protector of the Rhine Confederation, what has be- 
come of that ? Where are the German vassals of him 
who was but now a Charlemagne? How lugubri- 
ously they sound in the ears of a conqueror, those 
words, "Diminution, decadence!" Perhaps he rec- 
ognized more fully at the Tuileries than he had done 
at Elba, his change of fortune ; perhaps he is there 
more saddened by the clouds which hide the shining 
of his star. 



VIII. 

MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

WHILE Napoleon, greeted by enthusiastic accla- 
mations, was marching as a victor from Gre- 
noble to the Tuileries, the cries of fury which 
resounded against him in Vienna and throughout 
all Germany never ceased to strike the ears of his 
unfaithful spouse. It was not with pleasure that 
Marie Louise learned that the Emperor had quitted 
Elba, but with fear. Apprised of the news on coming 
in from a walk, she seemed at first to ignore it. At 
Schoenbrunn everything went on that evening just 
as usual, — dinner, music, billiards. But the next 
day, when the great event became known to the 
French members of her household, it awakened 
emotions so keen that one of the officials thought it 
his duty to issue an order of the day prohibiting 
all remarks upon the burning subject. Marie Louise 
herself broke the silence. Her words betrayed the 
trouble of her mind. She said the dangers which 
the Emperor was incurring disquieted her extremely ; 
she wa's sure he would not succeed; her own situation 

111 



112 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

would become still more painful. Her uncle, the 
Archduke John, Viceroy of Italy, is credited with 
saying to her, " My poor Louise, I pity you ; what 
I should like for you and for us, too, is that your 
husband should break his neck." 

Nevertheless, the prisoner of the Coalition had 
for a short time some inclination to better senti- 
ments. When the Austrian Emperor was certain that 
Napoleon had gone to France, and not to Italy, as 
was at first believed, his anger moderated, and he told 
his daughter that if, contrary to all expectation, her 
husband should succeed, perhaps she would be per- 
mitted to rejoin him in case a pacific policy should 
prevail. Then began an internal struggle in her 
breast. According to M. de Meneval, the confidant 
of her inward anxieties and fluctuations, she would 
declare one day that she would never return to 
France because she could see no hope of repose for 
that country ; on the next she would say that if her 
husband renounced all projects of conquest and would 
reign peacefully, she was convinced that no obstacle 
would be interposed to her return, and she would 
herself have no repugnance against it, because she 
had always felt a liking for the French. 

Napoleon's cause, then, was not absolutely despe- 
rate at Vienna, at least during the early days of 
March. But in making his calculations he had for- 
gotten a Frenchman more pitiless toward him than 
the most ruthless of the foreigners resolved on his 
destruction. This was the man whom he had cov- 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE UUNDREi) DAYS. 113 



ered — nay, overwhelmed — with benefits; the ruined, 
unfrocked priest of whom he had made a minister, 
a prince, a great dignitary of the Empire. The same 
^Talleyrand who had longed to exile his former sov- 
ereign to the Azores, bound up once more the 
fagot of the Coalition and reconstructed the Holy 
Alliance, despite the antagonism existing between 
the Cabinets of Vienna and Saint Petersburg. On 
March 13, 1815, the same day on which Napoleon, 
greeted with joy by the army and the people, left 
Lyons to continue his triumphant march to the Tui- 
leries, his former Minister of Foreign Affairs had suc- 
ceeded in obtaining the signatures of the Powers to 
the declaration of March 13 — that diatribe wherein 
he said, in most undiplomatic language, a medley 
of hate and terror : " In breaking the agreement by 
which he had been established at the Island of Elba, 
Bonaparte destroyed his sole legal title to existence. 
By reappearing in France, bent on projects of con- 
vulsion and dissension, he has proved, in the fage of 
the universe, that there can be neither peace nor 
truce with him. The Powers declare, in conse- 
quence, that Napoleon Bonaparte is placed outside 
of all relations, both civil and social, and that, as an 
enemy and disturber of the peace of the world, he is 
handed over to public vengeance." The day after, 
Talleyrand wrote thus to M. de Jaucourt concerning 
this savage document, a sort of encouragement to 
assassination, whose violence the Powers themselves 
speedily regretted : " My dear friend, I send the King 



114 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

the declaration of which I spoke yesterday. It is 
very strong ; no document of such force and impor- 
tance has ever been signed by all the sovereigns of 
Europe." 

On the same day, March 14, Talleyrand addressed 
the following paper to Louis XVIII. It was printed 
at Vienna, and spread broadcast throughout Germany, 
under the title, Warning to the Nations : — 

" Bonaparte no longer desires to reign save for the 
welfare of the Jacobins. He contents himself with 
the actual boundaries of France, and proposes to live 
in peace with the rest of Europe. As surety he 
offers: 1st. The grapeshot wherewith he destroyed 
the Sections of Paris. 2d. The poisoning of the hos- 
pitals in Egypt. 3d. The assassination of Pichegru. 
4th. The murder of the Duke of Enghien. 5th. The 
oaths tnken to the French Republic. 6th. His re- 
peated assaults upon all the governments of Europe. 
7th. The spoliation of churches in Russia and Spain. 
8th. His escape from Elba. 9th. The organization 
of three thousand battalions of the National Guard to 
replace the conscription. 10th. The violation of every 
treaty he has signed, including that of Fontainebleau. 
11th. The abolition of collective rights in favor of 
public enthusiasm." 

At this very time there was circulating in Ger- 
many a work by Maurice Arndt, entitled a Catechism 
for Crerman Soldiers and Military Men^ in which 
instructions were given concerning the duties of a 
Christian warrior. Its sixth chapter ran thus : — 



MABIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 115 

" COXCERNIXG THE GrEAT TyRANT. 

"And the abyss is open, saith the Lord, and hell 
has vomited its poison and set free its venomous 
serpents. 

" And a monster is born, an abomination soiled 
with blood has risen up. 

" And his name is Napoleon Bonaparte, a name of 
desolation, a name of woe, a name of malediction for 
widows and orphans, a name which will resound at 
the day of judgment amid outcries of despair. 

" And yet many have adored him, and made him 
the idol of their soul; they have named him the 
Saviour, the Liberator, the Man who comes in the 
name of the Lord to redeem the world. 

"And yet I know him not, saith God; I have 
reproved him and I will reprove him, and there 
shall be in him neither felicity, nor salvation, nor 
liberty. 

"But he has become powerful by lying; he has 
built up his throne by murder and by treachery ; and 
it is a sign of the times, and the mark of the sins of 
the children of men, and it proves how far they have 
wandered from the way of justice, that they have 
called it deliverance from oppression. 

" Arise, ye peoples ! Slay him, for I have cursed 
him ; destroy him, for he is the destroyer of liberty 
and law." 

This appeal to murder proves to what a pitch of 
hatred German wrath had risen against the man 
returned from Elba. Marie Louise heard nothing 



116 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

but imprecations against her husband, and the Ger- 
manic sentiments of her childhood and early youth 
awakened anew, and, perhaps, in her own despite, in 
the depths of her soul. On March 12, the eve of the 
declaration of the Powers, she caused General Neip- 
perg, who constantly grew more influential with her, 
to write to Prince Metternich that she had no part 
in Napoleon's projects, and placed herself under the 
protection of the Allies. From that moment she 
decided irrevocably never to return to France. 

Napoleon, on the other hand, was striving with all 
his might to regain possession of his wife and son, 
whom he was awaiting at Paris with extreme im- 
patience. The Duke of Vicenza, his Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, tried in vain to renew relations with 
the Powers, and especially with Austria. General 
Baron de Vincent, who represented Vienna at the 
Court of Louis XVIII., demanded his passport on 
March 22. Nevertheless, he consented to have a 
secret and private interview with the Duke of 
Vicenza at the house of Madame de Souza before 
leaving Paris. The Duke tried in vain to plead 
his master's cause. All he could obtain was that one 
of the secretaries of the Austrian Embassy, M. de 
Rechtembourg, who was going to Vienna, should 
carry thither two letters from Napoleon, — one to 
his wife, and the other to his father-in-law, — also a 
letter for Prince Metternich. These letters reached 
their destination. But, being submitted to the Con- 
gress, they were as barren of results as had been 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 117 

those addressed to Marie Louise from Grenoble and 
Lyons by her husband. 

Meanwhile an unceasingly annoying vigilance was 
exercised over the few French attendants who re- 
mained near the former Empress. All communica- 
tion with France was rigorously interdicted; not 
even a French newspaper reached Vienna. The iron 
ring tightened daily about Marie Louise — for that 
matter, she had become the accomplice of her jailers. 

On March 20, 1815, the very day on which Napo- 
leon re-entered the Tuileries to celebrate there the 
birthday of the King of Rome, the child was torn 
from the arms of his governess, the virtuous and 
devoted Countess of Montesquiou, who had never 
quitted him since the hour when he came into the 
world, and who had always given him the care and 
affection of a mother. Talleyrand wrote thus to 
Louis XVIII . on that date : — 

"Sire: The Emperor Francis has just ordered 
Madame de Montesquiou to deliver up to him the 
child whom she has had in charge. Her language 
under existing circumstances has been so opposed 
to the resolutions taken by Austria and the other 
Powers, that the Emperor is unwilling to permit 
her to remain any longer near his grandson. To- 
morrow she should receive the order to return to 
France. The child will live in the palace at Vienna, 
where he will be guarded from the abduction wliich 
certain circumstances have made it seem probable 
will be attempted." 



118 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBED DAYS, 



Madame de Montesquieu's crime in the eyes of 
the implacable Coalition was to have remained faith- 
ful to her benefactor; to have continued to speak 
of the great Napoleon before the little one ; to have 
said to the child, morning and evening, " Monseign- 
eur, pray for your father." The despair of Mamma 
Quiou, as the King of Rome called her, was very 
great. She obliged her persecutors themselves to 
give proofs of their esteem for her. In protesting 
against the violence which deprived her of the func- 
tions she had fulfilled with so much zeal, she obtained 
a written order from the Emperor Francis, and a 
medical certificate attesting that she left her pupil in 
perfect health. But she demanded in vain that the 
Vienna Gazette should publish a formal denial of the 
pretended plot for carrying off the young Prince, 
which had been attributed to her son. Colonel Ana- 
tole de Montesquieu. 

At this moment there was a person of whom Marie 
Louise was thinking much more than of her husband 
or her son. It was General Neipperg, who was pre- 
paring to go to war with Murat, who had once more 
become the ally of France and Napoleon. Furious 
at having been juggled with by Austria, which, after 
guaranteeing him his throne, had declared for a res- 
toration of the Bourbons, he had sincerely repented 
of his conduct. On December 7, 1814, his represen- 
tative at Vienna, the Duke of Campo-Chiaro, had 
remitted to Prince Talleyrand a note in these terms : 
" The King of Naples was a party to the Coalition 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 119 

whose efforts and success have placed Louis XVIII. 
on the throne of France ; his adhesion to this Coali- 
tion was not without utility to the common cause. 
The King of Naples has the right, therefore, to 
expect amicable relations with the house of Bourbon 
for which he finds that he has contended. Austria 
stipulated not only for itself, but for the Allies in 
the treaty concluded May 30, 1814, and the King of 
Naples had a solemn treaty with Austria which was 
known to all Europe." 

Murat very soon understood that he had made a 
mistake in abandoning his brother-in-law and the 
French, companions of his exploits. The Princess 
Pauline Borghese, arriving at Naples from the Island 
of Elba, reconciled him with Napoleon, and ever 
since November, 1814, he had said of the eleven 
hundred soldiers the Emperor had with him there, 
" They are the nucleus of five hundred thousand." 
On March 24, 1815, he wrote to Napoleon : " I learn 
with inexpressible joy that Your Majesty has landed 
on the shores of the Empire. I should have been 
glad to have received some instruction concerning 
the co-operation of my movements in Italy with yours 
in France. . . . Sire, I have never ceased to be your 
friend. I simply waited for a favorable occasion. It 
has come, and now I am going to prove that I was 
always faithful, and to justify in your eyes and in 
those of all Europe, the opinion you conceived of 
me. On any other occasion, I should have sacrificed 
myself in vain." 



120 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

When General Neipperg left Vienna, on April 1, 
1815, to begin the war with Murat, Napoleon's ally, 
Marie Louise, whose sympathies were no longer 
French, certainly desired the success of Austria, and 
especially of the Austrian general. He wrote volu- 
minous letters to her who had ceased all correspond- 
ence with her husband. The Machiavelian policy of 
the Coalition had borne its fruits. Neipperg was the 
counsellor, the confidant, the future minister, the 
future morganatic husband of the former Empress of 
the French. She was going to be — admitting that 
she was not so already — enthralled, body and soul, 
by this man, who, everywhere and always, from Swe- 
den to Naples, had figured among the most persever- 
ing and most relentless of Napoleon's enemies. 

However, Napoleon did not yet despair of recall- 
ing his wife to better sentiments. A few days after 
General Neipperg's departure, a mysterious envoy 
from Paris arrived at Vienna to make a supreme 
effort. One of the chief familiars of Prince Talley- 
rand had been a M. de Montrond, a man of the 
world, subtle, charming rather than serious, and more 
accustomed to the society of drawing-rooms than to 
politics. As he was both shrcAvd and witty, his oppo- 
sition and his sarcasms incurred the Emperor's anger, 
and he had imprisoned him in the fortress of Ham. 
He made his escape, however, and found a refuge in 
exile, whence he returned to France at the same 
time with the Bourbons. After the return from 
Elba he made advances to Fouche, Napoleon's Minis- 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 121 

ter of Police, who resolved to employ him in the hope 
of thus continuing relations with Prince Talleyrand. 
Who could have believed that M. de Montrond was 
to be the man whom the Emperor would charge with 
the most delicate and important secret mission. But 
as Napoleon desired at any price to see once more his 
wife and son, he would have accepted the services of 
any one Avhatever -who seemed likely to aid him in 
realizing this dearest of his wishes. 

M. de Montrond entered Vienna with a passport 
describing him as an Italian abbe ; preserving a strict 
incognito, he had secret interviews with Talleyrand 
(whom he found more deeply pledged to the Bourbon 
cause than he had supposed), and afterwards with M. 
de M^neval. To the latter he delivered a letter for 
Marie Louise from Napoleon, and others written by 
the Duke of Vicenza to Madame de Montesquiou 
and to M. de Meneval himself. " He told me, laugh- 
ing," says Meneval, " that he w^as authorized to ab- 
duct the Empress, disguising her in men's clothes if 
necessary, and not to mind her roguish ways. He 
made several other remarks in the same vein of witty 
raillery which is characteristic of him, and which 
proved to me what I was quite disposed to believe, 
that this abduction scheme was a jesting notion of his 
own rather than the object of his mission. He was 
surprised at the unexpected confidence placed in him 
at Paris, whence he had been hunted and exiled. I 
was surprised myself, for it seemed to me much more 
likely that he came to work for M. de Talleyrand 



122 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS, 

than for the Emperor ; as a matter of fact he had a 
secret mission from the Duke of Otranto for that 
minister. He stayed at the palace of the French 
Embassy." 

To this strange envoy M. de Meneval gave several 
meetings, sometimes at Vienna, sometimes at Schoen- 
brunn. There Fouchd's agent, strolling through gar- 
dens and greenhouses, passed as an amateur in bot- 
any, in order to put off their guard the many spies 
surrounding the residence of Marie Louise. 

In a letter addressed to Louis XVIIL, on April 13, 
1815, Talleyrand thus expressed himself concerning 
M. de Montrond's secret mission : - — 

" All that reaches me irom France proves that Bo- 
naparte is greatly embarrassed there. I am still more 
convinced of it by the emissaries whom he sends 
here. One of these, M. de Montrond, has reached 
Vienna through the intervention of the Abb^ Altien, 
an attache of the Austrian legation at Paris. He has 
neither a despatch nor any ostensible mission, and 
possibly was sent by those who serve Bonaparte rather 
than by Bonaparte himself. This is what I incline 
to believe. He brought verbal messages to M. de 
Metternich, M. de Nesselrode, and me. His business 
was to ascertain whether the foreign Powers were 
seriously determined not to recognize Bonaparte and 
meant to make war against him. He had also a 
letter for Prince Eugene. What he was told to ask 
me was, whether I could really intend to excite war 
against France. Read the declaration by which I 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 123 



answered him. It does not contain a word contrary 
to my opinion. Moreover, it is not a war against 
France which is in question, but simply one against 
the man of the Island of Elba. Of M. de Metternich 
he inquired whether the Austrian government had 
totally lost sight of the ideas it held in March, 1814. 
' The regency ? We don't want that,' answered M. 
de Metternich. Finally he endeavored to find out 
the intentions of the Emperor Alexander through M. 
de Nesselrode. ' Bonaparte's destruction and that of 
his family,' said the latter. And there things rest. 
M. de Montrond has been made acquainted with the 
condition of the forces to be immediately employed, 
and also with the treaty of the 25th of March last. 
He has gone back to Paris with this information and 
these responses, which ought to give those who are 
at present attached to Bonaparte's fortunes a good 
deal to think about." 

M. de Montrond took back to Paris a letter to the 
Duke of Vicenza from M. de Meneval, dated April 
7, 1815. Among other items of news, M. de Mene- 
val gave Napoleon's Minister of Foreign Affairs some 
painful and singular details concerning the senti- 
ments of Marie Louise : " I do not know when the 
Empress will go to France," said the faithful servi- 
tor. "At present the Cabinet is far from being 
inclined to permit it. The mind of the Empress is 
so disturbed that the prospect of returning thither 
fills her with terror; for six months every possible 
means has been employed to detach her from the 



124 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 

Emperor. . . . When by accident I have been able 
to get a word with her, I have implored her to re- 
main neutral and to sign nothing. But she has been 
induced to take several occasions to declare her igno- 
rance of the Emperor's plans and her wish to place 
herself under the protection of her father and his 
allies." 

In the same letter M. de Meneval gives an account 
of a conversation he has just had with the forgetful 
Princess : " Last Sunday, dining alone with the Em- 
press, Her Majesty said to me, after dinner, that the 
Congress had just signed an act assuring the Duchy 
of Parma to her, but leaving for the present the ad- 
ministration of it to Austria which should make it 
pay her one hundred thousand francs a month. She 
said she had not been able to obtain the inheritance 
of the duchy for her son ; her heir must be the son 
of the Queen of Etruria ; but that she will obtain 
the Bohemian fiefs of the Archduke Ferdinand, 
which yield a revenue of about six hundred thousand 
francs; also, that she had taken an irrevocable de- 
termination never to be reunited to the Emperor. 
Pressed concerning the motive of this singular reso- 
lution, after several reasons which I undertook to 
set aside, she avowed that as she had not shared his 
disgrace, she could not share a prosperity she had 
done nothing to bring about. . . . While waiting 
for this tangle to get smoothed out, I went on talk- 
ing to her about the happiness which had been caused 
in France by the Emperor's return, the impatience 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DATS. 125 



with which she is expected there, and the desire the 
Emperor has to see her ; but I spoke soberly, for the 
subject annoys her. All must be left to time and the 
Emperor's moderation. No matter how prudently I 
act, I am subjected to the basest espionage. A swarm 
of ignoble spies prowl about me and comment on every 
gesture, movement, and expression of countenance. 
I fear I shall not be retained here much longer; 
I need to breathe a different air and to see you 
all ; my health is impaired. No one but the Empress 
and her son enjoy brilliant health. The Empress 
has grown much stouter ; the Prince Imperial is an 
angel of beauty, strength, and sweetness. Madame 
de Montesquiou sheds tears about him every day." 

In a postscript dated April 8, M. de Meneval added : 
" I have written you hastily and without order. I 
have a thousand other things to tell you which it 
would take too long to write. What I presume to 
recommend you to be most circumspect about is that 
which relates to the person of the Empress. This 
Princess is really good-hearted, but at present she is 
dominated by foreign influences." 

Napoleon insisted on seeing the original of this 
letter. It is easy to understand how <:reatly it must 
have pained him. 

Marie Louise was all the more culpable because, 
had she acted in conformity with her duties as wife 
and mother, as Frenchwoman and Empress, she 
miofht have secured, if not the reconciliation of her 
husband with the Powers, at least the accession of 



126 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

her son. Even the bitterest enemies of her husband, 
as, for example, Benjamin Constant, had rallied to 
him. Many people considered the cause of the Bour- 
bons as forever lost. At Ghent, French emigration 
was frequently discouraged. On March 27, M. de 
Jaucourt wrote to Talleyrand : " I am no longer good 
for anything; do not give me any mission; I want 
none. A little intrigue is all anybody is going to 
have to do outside the Congress, if that continues, 
and we are already assuming an appearance of emi- 
gration which I find odious." And again on April 
11: "Nothing is so easy as to ruin and devastate 
France and bring about a revolution in its govern- 
ment; nothing is so difficult as to save it, to put it 
back where it was on the morrow of the royal meet- 
ing. Great God ! what a road we have passed since 
that time." 

Hostilities had not yet begun. Notwithstanding 
the declaration of March 13, the violence of which 
was alread.y regretted, Europe felt a certain hesitation 
to reopen strife. In England a strong opposition had 
declared itself against the warlike attitude of the 
Ministry toward France, and the Cabinet was obliged 
to conceal from Parliament the treaty of March 25, 
by which the Powers had renewed their treaty of 
Chaumont. In spite of what Talleyrand had written 
to Louis XVIII., neither Austria nor even Russia 
would have absolutely repelled the idea of a regency 
under Marie Louise. If this Princess had cordially 
pleaded the cause of her husband and her son, if she 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 127 



had made an ardent appeal to the chivah-ous senti- 
ments of the Czar, the Bourbons would probably 
never have remounted the throne. 

Alexander had been very indignant when he 
learned that a secret treaty against liim had been 
signed during the Congress by England, Austria, and 
France. He considered it an act of monstrous ingrat- 
itude on the part of Louis XVIII., for it was he who 
had given him the crown of France some months 
before ; there would have been needed but a word to 
make him proclaim Napoleon II., under the regency 
of Marie Louise. It was Madame de Krudener, in 
her rage at having been disdained by Napoleon not 
long before, who decided the Emperor Alexander, 
the white angel^ as she styled him, to declare against 
the man whom she called the black angel. Jacob, the 
bibliophile, in his curious book on the Czar's Egeria, 
says : " It cannot be denied that Madame de Krudener 
had a most fatal influence upon the destiny of the Em- 
peror Napoleon. It was she who fu-st proclaimed the 
decadence of Buonaparte, as she affected to name 
him ; it was she who, as if speaking in the name of 
God, boldly declared that Napoleon had ceased to 
reign and was about to be placed under the ban of 
the nations ; it was she, in fine, who, bringing all her 
influence to bear on the hesitating Alexander, caused 
the negotiations of Fontainebleau to be broken off 
and decided the re-establishment of the Bourbons. 
She publicly announced, in her Biblical phraseology, 
that men would presently see the Revolution, war, 



128 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DATS. 



and every woe, proceeding from the Island of Elba 
with the Mack angel, who would unloose all these 
scourges upon Europe." 

Nevertheless, the Emperor Alexander, opposed by 
France and Austria in his designs on Poland, and 
not less irritated against Talleyrand than against 
Metternich, may have more than once regretted 
having followed the advice of Madame de Krudener. 
When proclaimed by an unfrocked bishop, who had 
been a minister both of the Directory and the French 
Empire, the dogma of legitimacy produced no effect 
on the mind of Alexander. The Czar made no secret 
of his opinion that the suppression of the tricolored 
flag was a mistake. He approved the principles of 
the Parisian liberals. He accepted the idea of a 
monarchy under the Duke of Orleans almost as if he 
foresaw the Revolution of 1830, to which his succes- 
sor, the Emperor Nicholas, was, nevertheless, to be so 
hostile: Guinguende wrote to him, apropos of the 
return from Elbaj " The execution of the plan has 
been marvellous. It was accomplished as much by the 
absence of resistance as by the calm yet swift audacity 
of the attack. Oppressed, humiliated, dishonored by 
the Bourbons, France has received Napoleon as a 
liberator. He alone can rescue it from the abyss. 
What other name is there to take the place of his ? 
Let those of the Allies who are most capable of reflec- 
tion, reflect on this, and try in good faith to answer 
the question." 

The Czar experienced a secret antipathy towards 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS, 129 



the Bourboris of the elder branch. We desire no 
better proof of this than a curious letter from Talley- 
rand to Louis XVIII., which bears date April 23, 
1815, and may be found in the interesting collection 
published by M. Pallain. In it Talleyrand thus 
enumerates the Czar's grievances against the King: 
" For some time past I have had occasion to remark 
that if the Emperor of Russia often opposes what 
Your Majesty wishes, it is not always solely in view 
of some end which he is aiming at himself ; but still 
more, in certain circumstances, because he feels 
wounded : First, because Your Majesty did not offer 
him the blue ribbon, as well as the Prince Regent; 
second, on account of the futility of his intercession 
for the Duke of Vicenza, in whom he was warmly 
interested, and who was excluded from the Chamber 
of Peers ; third, on account of the firmness with 
which Your Majesty, on the question of marriage, 
refused to yield to his wishes on the religious point ; 
fourth, because the constitutional charter differs on 
many points from the views he expressed in Paris on 
the subject, and which his attachment to liberal ideas 
made him consider very useful and very important." 
In the same letter Talleyrand reports a conversa- 
tion which had just taken place between the Emperor 
Alexander and Lord Clancarty : " Our first duties," 
said the Czar, "are towards Europe and ourselves. 
Even were the re-establishment of the King's govern- 
ment easy, yet, so long as there can be no certainty of 
its future stability, what should we do in re-establish- 



130 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS, 

ing it except to prepare new afflictions for France 
and Europe ? If what has happened once should 
happen again, should we be as united as we are 
to-day? Should we have nearly a million of men 
under arms? Should we be ready at the moment 
when danger impended? And what probability is 
there, the elements of disorder remaining the same, 
that the government of the King would be more 
stable than it has been ? In a word, whatever opin- 
ion one may have about it, since the re-establish- 
ment of the King, which we all desire, and which 
I desire particularly, may meet with insurmountable 
obstacles, therefore, this case being possible, it is good 
to look ahead and agree beforehand what should then 
be done." 

The Emperor of Russia added, when speaking of 
a possible imperial regency, this significant remark, 
which greatly increases the responsibility of Marie 
Louise for the fall of the Napoleonic dynasty : " Last 
year the regency might have been established; but 
the Archduchess Marie Louise., to whom I spoJce about 
it, will not at any price whatever return to France. 
Her son is to have an establishment in Austria, and 
she desires nothing further for him. I am certain, 
moreover, that Austria, on its part, no longer dreams 
of a regency or wishes for it. Last year it seemed to 
me as if that might have conciliated the different 
interests, but the situation is no longer the same. So 
that is a thing which need not be considered. I see 
nobody more likely to conciliate all than the Duke 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 131 



of Orleans. He is a Frencliman, he is a Bourbon, 
and the husband of a Bourbon; he has sons; when 
he was young he served the Constitutional Cause; 
he has worn the tricolored cockade which, as I often 
said at Paris, ought never to have been given up." 

In the same letter Talleyrand was not afraid to 
write to Louis XVIII.: "The Emperor Alexander 
said in ordinary conversation, that he could readily 
believe that Your Majesty, if you were alone, might 
suit France and be loved and respected there ; but, 
as you cannot be separated from those surrounding 
you, he fears that you will never be able to consoli- 
date your throne." 

From this letter it clearly appears that the Em- 
peror Alexander declined to be the defender of Marie 
Louise against her own wishes, and returned reluc- 
tantly to the elder branch of the Bourbons. They 
had shown him little gratitude, and yet, as is incon- 
testably known, they could never have reascended 
the throne if it had pleased him to oppose his veto 
to their restoration. But Fatality weighed thence- 
forward on the man whom Fortune had once covered 
with her favors. His wife, instead of serving him, 
was prejudicial to him. The former Empress, the 
former Regent, had disappeared to give place to the 
Duchess of Parma. The marvellous return from 
Elba had left her indifferent, and even hostile. One 
would have said she was ashamed to appear again in 
the great drama wherein she had played a leading 
part. 



132 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

The last ties, so feeble in any case, which might 
still have attached Marie Louise to France, were 
weakening every day. Her little French court was 
almost dispersed. Her lady of honor, Madame de 
Brignole, who had been so devoted to Napoleon, died 
on April 2. When the Emperor formed the house- 
hold of Marie Louise, in 1810, he appointed as one 
of the ladies of the palace the Marquise of Brignole- 
Sale, then called the Countess of Brignole, as the 
title of Marquis had been abolished by the Emperor. 
A member of one of the most illustrious Genoese 
families, the nobility of her character, and her up- 
right and distinguished mind placed her among the 
very small number of women with whom the Em- 
peror willingly conversed on serious matters, and 
even on questions of policy. When the allied troops 
entered Paris, she used every effort to induce the 
Regent not to leave the capital ; and, despite her 
chagrin at seeing her advice rejected, she followed 
Marie Louise to Vienna. When she fell ill there, 
the Empress gave her the most assiduous care, and 
wept for her as if she had been her mother. On her 
death-bed Madame de Brignole once more implored 
Marie Louise to rejoin Napoleon. 

The Countess of Montesquiou, after having been 
violently separated from her pupil, was confined in a 
small apartment of two rooms at Vienna, and neither 
she nor her son. Colonel Anatole de Montesquiou, 
were permitted to return to Paris. On the other 
hand, M. Balkouhey, the intendant of the household, 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 133 



was authorized to do so. Baron de Bausset was con- 
fined to his bed with gout. Baron de Meneval alone 
remained near Marie Louise, and he for a short time 
only, and against his inclination. He longed to ter- 
minate his stay at Schoenbrunn, where all his efforts 
in behalf of a husband and father had been so fruit- 
less. The type of honor and fidelity, this loyal ad- 
herent had neglected no means to recall Marie Louise 
to sentiments of duty. The journal which he kept at 
Schoenbrunn in 1814 and 1815 has been shown to me 
by his son. It is a very curious document. It con- 
tains nothing but facts without reflections, like the 
journal of Dangeau ; but if it is read with attention, 
it gives a thorough knowledge of the attitude of 
Marie Louise and her mode of life. The name of 
General Neipperg recurs constantly in this journal. 
Every day the same things are recorded of the Em- 
press : she rides with the General ; she dines with the 
General ; she plays or sings with the General. The 
word factotum comes in like a refrain. The seducer 
is perhaps still more influential when absent than 
when present. On April 1, 1815, occurs this entry : 
"General Neipperg left this morning at six. The 
Empress, who rose and dressed very early, learned 
his departure from a long letter which he left for 
her." On April 21 : " The Empress received a letter 
from General Neipperg, dated at Modena, on the 
14th. The Parmesan body-guards, having been un- 
willing to march against the Neapolitans, and several 
of them having cried ' Long live the Emperor ! ' this 



134 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

company was disbanded. At Parma the Empress 
herself will reward those who remained faithful." So 
what Marie Louise most desired was that the soldiers 
of her duchy should oppose her husband. And when, 
on May 2, the unfortunate Murat, who, as Napoleon 
remarked, twice ruined France — once by abandoning 
her, and again by returning to her too soon — was 
completely beaten by the Austrians at the battle of 
Tolentino, the Empress Marie Louise was the person 
who rejoiced most over General Neipperg's success. 
During his absence she had heard a piece of news 
which apparently did not afflict her: it announced 
the death of the General's wife. On this subject M. 
de Mdneval says : " The death of the Countess Neip- 
perg passed unnoticed except at Schoenbrunn, where 
it excited keen interest. This lady had remained 
at Wiirtemberg, where General Neipperg originated -^ 
when he came to Vienna to seek employment for his 
talents. She died in April, after two days' illness, 
leaving four boys. They say she was very pretty, 
but not very intelligent. Count Neipperg had ab- 
ducted her from her husband, who was still living a 
few months before his wife's death. The manner in 
which the Empress Marie Louise announced this 
death one morning at table was not indicative of 
much regret." 

The strange affection felt by Napoleon's wife for 
General Neipperg overpowered every other senti- 
ment. She had so absolutely disowned France and 
her husband, that when the processions for the sue- 



MARIE LOUISE DURING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 135 

cess of the war began in Vienna on April 16, her 
step-mother, the Austrian Empress, had no scruples 
about asking her to take part in them. It is true 
that she refused compliance with an invitation so 
humiliating that even her father and her uncles saAv 
the impropriety of it. In mentioning the fact, M. de 
M^neval adds this sorrowful reflection : " The Em- 
press Marie Louise manifested sentiments appropriate 
to her position ; but it costs me much to admit that 
she seemed to act in this way chiefly to preserve her 
right to persevere in her refusal to go back to France." 
The faithful and loyal Meneval had lost all hope 
of winning back Marie Louise to better sentiments. 
The last interview he had with her on this painful 
subject robbed him of all illusions. She would not 
return to France for any consideration whatever, 
even if the Allies and her father should grant her 
their permission. "Some words," he says, "were 
exchanged between us on the painful subject of her 
refusal to rejoin the Emperor. She replied with 
some vivacity, but yet with her usual sweetness, 
that her resolution was irrevocable. When I objected 
that there was no such thing as an irrevocable resolu- 
tion, and that some circumstance might occur which 
would render her return to France obligatory, she was 
in haste to reply that her father himself would have 
no right to force her. The remark escaped me that 
the sentiments that she was expressing were unjust 
and out of keeping with her character; that if the 
French nation were made aware of this repugnance, 



136 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 



they would be wounded by it, as they were ex- 
tremely sensitive when their attachment was dis- 
dained, and would then reject her, although they had 
desired her presence as a pledge of peace. This con- 
versation was the last I had with her on this matter." 

Even to have abandoned her husband was not 
enough for Marie Louise. She allowed her son to 
be taken from her. She and the little Prince no 
longer lived under the same roof. She remained 
at Schoenbrunn, while the child was at Vienna, in 
his grandfather's palace. She knew that when she 
should go to reign in Parma, that duchy which was 
to be hers for life only, she would have no right to 
take the little Prince there with her. And yet the 
Duchy of Parma was like the Promised Land to her, 
because she was certain that her favorite would be at 
her side. This man's love outweighed all things else. 

M. de Mdneval comprehended that his presence at 
Schoenbrunn had become worse than useless. He 
requested his passports for France on April 9, and 
had been waiting for them nearly a month. Before 
taking his departure he went to the imperial palace 
at Vienna to bid adieu to the Prince, and was struck 
by the child's serious and melancholy air. His 
charming gaiety and graceful loquacity had given 
place to constraint, embarrassment, and timidity. He 
cast uneasy glances about him. His precocious sad- 
ness — he was a little more than four years old- — 
almost persuaded one that he had already a presenti- 
ment of his sorrowful destiny. " Monseigneur," M. 



MARIE LOUISE BUBING THE HUNDRED DAYS. 137 



de Mdneval said to him, "I am going to see your 
father again. Have you any messages for him?" 
The child, as if he felt liimself surrounded by evil- 
disposed persons, remained silent; withdrawing his 
hand from that of his father's faithful servant, he 
went without speaking to the embrasure of the far- 
thest window. Then he beckoned Meneval tc> ap- 
proach, and said in a whisper, " Monsieur 3Ieva, tell 
him that I always love him well." 

On May 6, at ten in the evening, M. de Mene- 
val took leave of the Empress Marie Louise. This 
woman, ordinarily so unmoved, could not avoid 
yielding to a brief emotion. Possibly a secret re- 
morse agitated the depths of her soul. After saying 
a few courteous words to this high-principled man, 
whose noble counsels had been, alas! of so little 
avail, she expressed herself nearly in these words: 
"I feel that all relations between me and France are 
about to cease. But I shall always preserve the 
memory of that adopted land. Assure the Emperor 
of my good wishes. I hope that he will comprehend 
my unhappy position. I will never consent to a 
divorce ; but I flatter myself that he will agree to 
a friendly separation and will not conceive any re- 
sentment on that account. Such a separation has 
become indispensable. It will not alter the senti- 
ments of esteem and gratitude which I preserve." 
Then she gave M. de Meneval a snuff-box, orna- 
mented with her monogram in diamonds, and retired 
to conceal her emotion, which was beginning to 
overcome her self-control. 



IX. 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 



ON arriving at Paris, M. de M^neval waited at 
once on Napoleon to give him the news so long 
expected with impatience. The Emperor was over- 
whelmed with sadness. On April 17, he had left the 
Tuileries, a dismal abode, full of gloomy souvenirs, 
and installed himself at the Elysee. There he could 
sometimes interrupt his immense labors by walks 
under beautiful trees, whose shadows cooled his 
fevered temples. He felt that, in spite of all his 
genius, the earth was failing beneath his feet. From 
afar he heard the tramp of innumerable battalions 
advancing upon France, and understood that, sooner 
or later, heroism must succumb to numbers. A pro- 
found melancholy took possession of his soul. He 
cast on men and things a glance that was discerning 
but discouraged. If his son had been there, if he 
could have rested his eyes upon the blond head of his 
sweet and amiable child, he might have had some 
moments of repose. But the King of Rome was far 
away. The prisoner of the Coalition, he had the 
destiny of Astyanax, — that fatal destiny which his 
father had foreboded. 

138 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 139 



]M. de M^neval found the Emperor sitting on a 
tete-a-tete, his head resting on his hand, plunged 
apparently in a sombre reverie. Having received 
his faithful servant with great cordiality, Napoleon 
took him into the garden, where he plied him with 
questions. The least details about his son were in the 
highest degree interesting to his paternal heart. All 
that he said of the Empress was full of deference and 
consideration. He deplored the trials to which she 
had been exposed, and w^hile recognizing that her 
sentiments toward France and himself had been vio- 
lated, he was ready to go even further than M. de 
M^neval to find excuses for her. 

When they came to political topics, the Emperor 
said that it w^as the Duke of Orleans, and not Louis 
XVIII., whom he had dethroned by returning from 
Elba, for the latter would not have been able to reign 
in France six months longer. He regretted it, be- 
cause the Duke was the only Frenchman of his family. 
" Napoleon was touched by the patriotic sentiments 
displayed by the Duke of Orleans two months before, 
in going to assume command of the Army of the 
North, placed under the orders of Marshal Mortier ; 
also with the letter he had written to this Marshal on 
returning in the retreat ; and, above all, by the words 
reported by Captain Athelin, one of his aides-de- 
camp, whom the Duke of Orleans had authorized to 
resume his post as an orderly officer of the Emperor. 
The Prince said to him that the first thing necessary 
was to prevent another foreign invasion of France, 



140 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

and that he esteemed him fortunate in being able to 
resume colors which he had himself abandoned with 
regret." 

Afterwards Napoleon spoke with tranquillity con- 
cerning the sovereigns, his pitiless enemies. What 
had occurred did not surprise him. He had compre- 
hended, when attempting his enterprise, that he could 
count on nothing but the courage of the nation and 
his own sword. " For the rest," he said with a melan- 
choly smile, " God is great and merciful." 

After relating this conversation, pathetic in its 
simplicity, M. de Mdneval adds : " All his language 
was marked by a calm sadness and resignation which 
made a vivid impression on me. I no longer found 
him animated by that certainty of success which had 
formerly rendered him so confident ; it seemed as if 
that faith in Fortune which had emboldened him to 
form the hardy enterprise of coming back from Elba, 
and sustained in his march through France, had 
abandoned him at his entry into Paris. He felt that 
he was not seconded with the ardent and devoted 
zeal to which he had been accustomed, and that his 
movements, hampered by the trammels he had sub- 
mitted to, had no longer the same freedom." 

The unhappy Emperor could no longer entertain 
'S.ny illusions, either concerning the ingratitude of his 
wife, the hostility of his father-in-law, or the hatred 
of the kings who were once his vassals. Treated like 
a pariah by his enemies, he was put under the ban of 
Europe, and held up to public vengeance as the vilest 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 141 



of criminals. And yet he did not complain. His 
voice, once so haughty and so terrible, softened 
almost to prayer. He desired to be moderate, just, 
pacilic. He invoked with sincerity those great moral 
laws which of old he had so frequently forgotten. 
Ah ! if he could but apply his powerful intelligence 
to works of civilization, if he could be the benefactor 
of France and of Europe, if he could at last appear 
in the character of a gentle and beneficent monarch, 
could administer justice beneath an oak, like Saint 
Louis, and merit, like Louis XIL, the name of the 
father of the people ! But a mysterious voice said to 
him, " It is too late." Warlike in his own despite, 
he was condemned to war by fatality — and what a 
war ! Li meditating on the final struggle in which he 
was about to engage, he sometimes said that perhaps, 
like Louis XIV., he should gain a victory of Denain ; 
for the next battle, the decisive battle, he would give 
himself, and, as a general, he certainly was not inferior 
to Villars. Alas ! the France of 1815 did not resem- 
ble the France of 1712. That France was ruined, 
enfeebled, harassed, but it was united, and even the 
peasants who browsed on herbs like cattle, still cried, 
" Long live the King ! " But this France, though less 
exhausted, lacked unity and concord. In Yendde 
there had been a rising against the tricolored flag. 
In every department of the Empire the Royalists made 
no secret of their desire for the foreigner's success. 
The saying of the Gospel was about to be realized, 
"Every house divided against itself shall perish." 



142 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

One might have said that the same country contained 
two different nations. In spite of the absolute cen- 
tralization which the Revolution thought it had estab- 
lished, there was no unity in France, and the two 
flags symbolized the bitter dissensions which divided 
its citizens from one another. 

It was in vain that Napoleon made a loyal trial 
of liberty. Nobody believed in the sincerity of his 
intentions. The enemies of the Empire continued 
to repeat that the Additional Act was only a decoy. 
The journals used the freedom accorded to them 
merely to paralyze the national defence by their criti- 
cisms and their alarms. Napoleon recalled his brother 
Lucien, whom public opinion approved for having 
more than once refused a crown. The time was long 
past when it was an unpardonable crime for a brother 
of the new Charlemagne to have married a private 
person. Napoleon put around Lucien's neck the 
broad ribbon of the Legion of Honor which he had 
worn himself when coming from Elba to Paris. " It 
is too disgraceful to me that you should not have it," 
he said to him. 

Lucien installed himself in the Palais Royal and 
made up his household. He retained in his service 
all the domestics of the Orleans family who were 
willing to remain. He found Napoleon sad and 
weary. " He has a great propensity to sleep," said 
Lucien; "it is an effect of his malady. He is sur- 
prised himself that, with this habitual drowsiness, he 
should have had the energy to return from Elba. 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 143 

He is projecting a Field of May," adds Lucien, 
" where I proposed to him to abdicate. It seemed to 
me that he was not very unwilling. A few days 
later, instead of the abdication, he communicated to 
me his Additional Articles. I dared to contradict 
him. 'A million of souls missing at the least,' 
said I to him. He treated me like a di'iveller. He 
got into a rage, just as he used to. I bore it in 
silence ; the situation is so different ! Inwardly I 
said, 'Alas! he is unchanged.' He declared that 
he would not permit me to have a seat in the legisla- 
tive body. He suspects me of a secret ambition to 
be elected president of it, with the idea of making a 
new 18th Brumaire against him. I was angry and 
went away. Joseph reconciled us. The costumes 
were decided on for the ceremony of the Field of 
May. I said I would not wear white, but simply the 
uniform of the National Guard. The Emperor said 
with a disagreeable smile, * Yes ; so that you as a 
National Guard may produce more effect than I as 
Emperor — is that it ? ' I decided to wear white." 

While the preparations were in progress for the 
Field of May, Napoleon heard something which 
afflicted him all the more because he saw in it a 
sinister presage for himself. In vain had Murat, his 
sole ally, essayed to rouse Italy against Austria, and 
dreamed of the part which Victor Emmanuel played 
successfully later on. At Rimini, on March 31, he 
had issued this proclamation: "Italians, you were 
once masters of the world, and you have expiated 



144 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

your glory by twenty centuries of oppression. Make 
it to-day your ambition to have no more masters. 
Seas and inaccessible mountains, these are your 
boundaries. The question is whether Italy shall be 
free, or whether you will submit to foreign domina- 
tion. I call to my side all the heroes of Italy." This 
first germ of Italian unity was stifled. The cries of 
" Long live Joachim the Italian ! " remained almost 
unechoed. The daring sovereign was completely 
beaten at Tolentino by two Austrian generals, Bian- 
chi and Neipperg — Neipperg, the man fatal to Napo- 
leon. On May 19, Murat, a fugitive and obliged to 
hide himself, reached Naples in the night. "Ma- 
dame," he said to his wife, when talking with her 
for the last time, "do not be surprised to see me 
living ; I have done all that I could to die." Then 
he left Naples as he had entered it and took refuge 
at Ischia, whence a merchant vessel brought him to 
Toulon. A few hours later his wife negotiated the 
surrender of Naples with the English and the Aus- 
trians, and embarked for Trieste. On May 20, exactly 
two months to a day after the tricolored flag had 
been raised upon the dome of the Tuileries, the 
Bourbon standard was run up on the walls of the 
capitol of the Two Sicilies. Napoleon, dreading the 
contagion of misfortune, would not permit Murat 
to come to Paris. He exiled him to Provence. It 
seemed to him that his own fate was foreshadowed 
in that of his brother-in-law. One might call Tolen- 
tino the prologue of Waterloo. The vanquished, ill- 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 145 

omened man was not to appear on the Field of May — 
and yet he would be so useful to head the French cav- 
alry at the time of the final struggle in whicii the 
Emperor is preparing to engage ! 

The ceremony of the Field of May had at first 
been intended to celebrate the inauguration of the 
liberal Empire and the coronation of Marie Louise 
and the King of Rome. But this second part of the 
original programme had to be abandoned, since the 
implacable Coalition had deprived Napoleon forever 
of his wife and child. A proclamation of the votes 
on the Additional Act, and a distribution of flags 
was all that remained. The votes were as follows : 
Affirmative, 1,300,000 ; negative, 4206. The affirm- 
ative votes for the Consulate for life had been 
3,577,259, and for the institution of the Empire, 
3,572,329. This diminution shows how much ground 
the Empire had lost. As to the Chamber of Repre- 
sentatives, hardly one hundred thousand electors 
made their appearance in the electoral colleges. 
Real enthusiasm no longer reigned anywhere except 
in the army, and it alone gave prestige to the last 
fete of the Empire. As usual, the account of it in 
the Moniteur was a dithyramb. " Never was there 
a fete more national," said the official journal, "never 
did a spectacle more imposing and more affecting 
meet the eyes of the French people. All that takes 
possession of and elevates the soul, the prayers of 
religion, the pact of a great people with its monarch, 
France represented by the ^lite of its citizens, culti- 



146 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS, 



vators, merchants, magistrates, warriors, assembled 
around the throne, an immense population covering 
the Champ-de-Mars and uniting itself in spirit to the 
great objects of this magnificent ceremony, excited 
as ardent enthusiasm as any of which the most mem- 
orable epochs have left a souvenir." A good deal 
must be subtracted from this lyricism. Sadness un- 
derlay all the solemnities, and sombre presentiments 
took possession of men's souls. 

In the Champ-de-Mars, the theatre of the Federa- 
tion of July 14, 1790, there had been erected in haste 
some decorations as ephemeral as everything else 
was in those days. The imperial throne was placed 
in front of the Military School, in the centre of a vast 
semicircular enclosure with double tiers of seats to 
right and left, forming an amphitheatre capable of 
seating fifteen thousand spectators. A third tier, 
facing the throne, was open, and an altar was set up 
in the middle of it. About six hundred feet beyond 
the altar rose another solitary throne which domi- 
nated the entire Champ-de-Mars. Troops to the num- 
ber of fifty thousand, twenty-seven thousand of them 
being National Guards, passed in review before the 
Emperor. An immense crowd covered all the rising 
grounds of the Champ-de-Mars even to the Seine. 

Napoleon made his appearance in the carriage 
used at his coronation, drawn by eight horses ; he 
wore the silk habit, the plumed hat, and the imperial 
mantle. Nothing was lacking to his cortege, neither 
great officers of the crown, chamberlains, pages, nor 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 147 

heralds-at-arms. The marshals rode on hoi'seback 
beside his carriage. His brothers, Lucien, Joseph, 
and Jerome, wore mantles of white taffeta embroi- 
dered with gold, and the Arch-Chancellor Cambac^rds 
one of blue velvet sown with bees. 

Let the Emperor enjoy for the last time the joys 
of sovereignty ! Let him meditate on these theatri- 
cal pomps whose inanity he must by this time com- 
prehend ! These daises, this tinsel, these plumes, 
this gilding, — how much longer will they last ? At 
the bottom of the censers but a few grains of incense 
now remain. What has become of the time when 
the great nation believed itself invincible ? How 
different from the present solemnity was that of the 
distribution of the eagles on the morrow of the 
coronation ! How sad they look, this King of Spain, 
this King of Westphalia, for whom so much blood 
has been shed in vain ! And the Empress, the King 
of Rome, who were to be crowned on this Field of 
May, what has Providence done with them ? There 
is no concord in the fete. The Royalists secretly de- 
sire the coming of the foreigners. The Republicans 
regret to see the Emperor displaying those pomps of 
monarchy which appear to them anachronistic. The 
sceptics make many reflections when they behold, on 
the steps of the throne, Carnot, once a member of the 
Committee of Public Safety, now a Count of the 
Empire ; and beyond him Barrere, the Anacreon of 
the guillotine. The ceremonies, splendid as they are, 
are like the reproduction of an obsolete play. People 



148 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

scarcely listen to the Mass, which is said by the 
Archbishop of Tours, assisted by the Archbishop of 
Bourges and two other prelates. The official world 
turn their backs to the altar. The drums beat, 
and the Emperor rises to make his speech. Every- 
body pays attention ; so many conjectures have been 
made concerning this discourse ! Some imagine that 
he is about to announce the speedy arrival of his 
wife and son ; others, that he will abdicate either in 
favor of the King of Rome, or to proclaim the Re- 
public. Others still, and these are his most ardent 
partisans, think he is going to declare the country in 
danger, and name himself Dictator. All these pre- 
visions are incorrect. The Emperor announces noth- 
ing new in his discourse, and he ends it thus : 
" Frenchmen, my will is that of the people ; my 
rights are theirs ; my honor, my glory, my happiness, 
cannot be other than the honor, the glory, and the hap- 
piness of France." Then he swears allegiance to the 
Constitution, with his hand on the book of the Gos- 
pels, presented to him by the Archbishop of Bourges. 
Then rise shouts of " Long live the Emperor ! " with 
which some cries of " Long live the Empress ! " min- 
gle, and awake at first a sentiment of surprise. Does 
Marie Louise merit to be thus acclaimed ? But the 
soldiers, the heroic soldiers, still desire to believe 
in her ; and after a moment's silence, the military 
deputations brandish their swords and cry : " Long 
live the Empress ! Long live the King of Rome ! 
We will fetch them hither ! " 



THE FIELD OF MAT. 149 

Then the Emperor descended from the throne, and 
throwing off his mantle, he places himself on the first 
step of the pyramidal platform which stands in the 
middle of the Champ-de-Mars. " Soldiers of the 
National Guard of the Empire," he says, "Soldiers 
of the army and navy, I confide to you the imperial 
eagle of the national colors. Swear to defend it with 
your blood against the enemies of the fatherland. 
Swear to die rather than suffer strangers to make 
laws for- the fatherland." A formidable cry arises : 
" We swear it ! " Deputations from the different 
departments commencs filing past. To those from the 
Vosges, Napoleon says : '' You are my old compan- 
ions " ; to those from the Rhine : " You have been the 
first, the most courageous, and the most unfortunate 
in our disasters " ; to the departments of the Rhone : 
" I was brought up among you " ; and to others : 
"Your phalanxes were at Rivoli, at Arcole, at Ma- 
rengo, at Austerlitz." The ceremony becomes really 
grand, for the army has retained all its prestige. Here 
is the Imperial Guard marching by. " Soldiers of the 
Old Guard!" cries Napoleon, "swear to surpass your- 
selves in the coming campaign. Swear, all of you, to 
perish rather than suffer the foreigner to dictate laws 
to our country." In a time of apostasies and perju- 
ries, these men will keep their oath. They will not 
conquer ; they will die. 

The solemnity is over. It has been more like a 
funeral than a fete. The bands have been as noisy 
as ever, but there has been nothing joyous in their 



150 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

music. The drums should have been muffled in crape. 
Every one feels vaguely that the duel in which France 
is about to engage with Europe is unequal, and that 
sooner or later it must succumb. Napoleon no longer 
places confidence in his star. He feels himself already 
condemned by fate, and the splendid display of the 
Field of May has not for an instant distracted him 
from his sombre thoughts. 

Four days afterward, — Sunday, June 4, 1815, — 
the Emperor appeared at the Tuileries for the last 
time but one. Seated on his throne, he saw defile 
before him the electoral college, and deputations 
from the army and navy. Afterwards he assisted at 
Mass, and then went with his attendants to the great 
gallery of the Louvre, adorned with the masterpieces 
of painting, and there he conversed with everybody 
in an affable and easy way. At eight in the evening, 
a magnificent illumination irradiated the fa9ade of 
the Tuileries. An immense crowd, returning from 
the Champs-Elysees, where public games had been 
going on all day, had stopped before the Pavilion of 
the Horloge to listen to a grand concert. At nine, 
Napoleon, surrounded by his household, came out on 
the balcony and gave the signal for the fireworks to 
be set off in the Place de la Concorde. 

Bitter derision of Fortune ! This fete preceded by 
only fifteen days the greatest disaster of our history. 
Ah ! it was not illuminating lanterns which should 
have been lighted, but funeral torches i and since 
there was to be a concert at the Tuileries, they should 



THE FIELD OF MAY, 151 

have chanted lamentations and canticles of death. 
This throne, surrounded for the last time with so 
much splendor, cracks already, and is about to fall to 
pieces. One would say that France was singing to 
deafen its own ears. As he looks down at the lights 
with which the garden sparkles, the Emperor tliinks 
of the coming flashes of the bursting shells. Perhaps 
a sinister vision rises before him. In a few days, the 
Tuileries will be again illuminated, but this time it 
will be to honor the re-entrance of Louis XVIII. 
The gaiety of the people is forced. Doubt pierces 
through enthusiasm, and though the 3Ioniteur keeps 
up its lyrical attitude as heretofore, yet Mene, Mene, 
Tekel, Upharsin^ flame on the palace walls. In return- 
ing to the Elysee, the Emperor asked himself this 
question, full of anguish, "Will there be any more 
fetes for me at the Tuileries ? " and a mysterious 
voice answered, "No." Adieu majesty of the throne; 
adieu great retinues ; adieu resounding acclamations 
of the crowd ; adieu triumphant appearances on the 
iron balcony of the Horloge Pavilion ! Let the em- 
peror give place now to the general, for war approaches 
— war without its intoxications, without its trophies, 
but with all it has of gloom, and anguish, and fatal- 
ity ; war with discouragement, panic, defeat, massacre, 
and the order to retreat ; war with all its horrors, 
and not one of its dazzling illusions ; war such as it 
appears to philosophers by whom it is cursed, and to 
mothers who detest it ! 

On June 7 took place the opening of the Cham- 



152 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS, 

bers at the palace of the Legislative Body. Napo- 
leon thus finished his discourse : " It is possible that 
the first duty of a prince may soon call me to lead 
the children of the nation in order to fight for the 
fatherland. The army and I will do our duty. As 
for you, peers and representatives, set the nation an 
example of confidence, energy, and patriotism; and, 
like the Senate of the great people of antiquity, 
resolve to die rather than survive the dishonor and 
degradation of France. The sacred cause of the 
fatherland will triumph." 

No, the sacred cause of the fatherland will not 
triumph. For that, other dispositions would be 
necessary than those of the Assembly which, even 
while affecting devotion to the Emperor, was work- 
ing clandestinely against him. During his speech 
some of the representatives seemed to be studying 
the efforts he was making to soften his voice, his 
gestures, and the expression of his face, and to assume 
the unaccustomed manners of a constitutional sov- 
ereign. Lafayette, who was vice-president of the 
Chamber, wrote to a relative : " You will be satisfied 
with Napoleon's speech; but I was not so with his 
face, which seemed to me like that of an old despot 
irritated by the part which his position forces him 
to play. Flaugergues and I were near him for a 
long time while people were getting into their car- 
riages. ' You are looking younger,' he said to me ; 
' country air has done you good.' ' It has done me 
a great deal of good,' I answered. I could not re- 



THE FIELD OF MAY. 153 



turn the compliment, for I found him greatly altered, 
and with a very extraordinary contraction of the 
muscles. As neither of us was willing to lower his 
eyes, each of us read the other's thoughts." 

The address to the Chamber of Peers contained 
tliis remark: "If our success equals the justice of 
our cause, France cannot but reap peace. Our insti- 
tutions guarantee to Europe that the French gov- 
ernment cannot be carried away by the seductions 
of victory." And in his address to the Chamber 
of Representatives he said : " No ambitious design 
enters the thoughts of the French j)eople ; even the 
will of its victorious prince would be powerless to 
draw the nation beyond the limits of its own de- 
fence." Alas ! these precautions against victory were 
most inopportune, most superfluous. Napoleon could 
not refrain from saying sadly to a deputation from 
the two Chambers when he appeared for the last 
time at the Tuileries, Sunday, June 11: "The strug- 
gle in which we are engaged is serious. The seduc- 
tion of success is not the danger which threatens us 
to-day. The foreigners want to make us pass under 
the yoke of the Cauchne Forks." And he ended 
thus his prophetic speech : " The Constitution is our 
rallying-point ; it should be our polar star in these 
stormy moments. All political discussion which 
should tend to diminish, either directly or indirectly, 
the confidence people ought to place in its provisions 
would be a misfortune to the State. We should find 
ourselves in the midst of reefs without a compass 



154 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED BAYS. ■ 

and without a pilot. The crisis in which we are is 
very great. Let us not imitate the example of the 
Lower Empire, which, pressed on all sides by the 
barbarians, made itself a laughing stock to poster- 
ity by wrangling over abstract questions at the very 
moment when the battering-ram was breaking down 
the city walls." 

On Monday, June 12, 1815, at half -past three in 
the morning, and after bidding adieu to his ministers 
and embracing Queen Hortense, Napoleon left the 
Tuileries to take command of the army which, six 
days later, was to fight at Waterloo. Catching sight 
of General Bertrand's wife just as he was about get- 
ting into his carriage, he took her hand, and said, as 
if he had already a presentiment of Saint Helena, 
" Let us hope, Madame Bertrand, that we may not 
soon have to regret the Island of Elba." 



X. 



WATERLOO. 

" Waterloo ! Waterloo ! Waterloo ! O plain of sorrow ! 
Like a wave that boils in an um too narrow, 
In thy circle of wood, and hill, and plain. 
Pale Death commingled the ranks of slain. 
There 'twas France against all Europe — impact gory ! 
There 'twas God betrayed the hero's hope of glory. 
Thou hadst deserted, Victory, and Fate was worn. 
O Waterloo ! I weep, then cease to mourn ; 
For these last soldiers of our latest war 
Were grand ; the whole earth they had crushed before. 
Chased twenty kings, crossed Alps and crossed the Rhine, 
In brazen clarions sang their spirit fine ! " 

IT is thus that Victor Hugo, that Napoleon of 
poets, has had the force to celebrate Waterloo! 
But what a hymn of mourning ! what a sombre and 
lugubrious harmony! Never has the French lyre 
given forth more doleful sounds. 

Beranger, on his part, was unwilling that the 
fatal name of Waterloo should be pronounced in 
any song of his : — 

"In Athens, who with Chaeronea's name, 
Ever united sounds harmonious ? 
Dethroned by Fate, Athens cursed Philip's fame, 
And doubted gods once held victorious. 

155 



156 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

And such a day beheld our Empire fall, 
Beheld the stranger bringing in his chains, 

Beheld even Frenchmen basely smile in thrall. 
Its name shall make no discord in my strains." 

We find again the same sentiment which inspired 
the song-writer, at the close of the Memoirs of Gen- 
eral de Segur, who has traced the glories of the 
imperial epopee in prose, which at times assumes an 
epic turn. " Let others," he cries, " recite the heroic 
and marvellous details of Napoleon's return from 
Elba, his attempts, at first, to conciliate the Coali- 
tion, and then to prepare himself for the combat; 
in fine, his secret and sorrowful presentiments from 
the morrow of his arrival, his lost faith in his star, 
and the disastrous result of that third and last 
effort of an incomparable genius against his destiny, 
which had willed that the greatness of his eleva- 
tion should equal that of his downfall. However 
worthy of memory on this subject may be the rela- 
tions given me by eyewitnesses such as M. MoUien, 
my father, Benjamin Constant, Marshal Reille, Mont- 
yon, Turenne, Prince d'Eckmiihl, and others, I own 
that courage fails me to recount so many bitterly 
painful details." 

Alas ! we cannot pass over this fatal day in silence. 
It is the denouement of the terrible drama whose 
vicissitudes we have essayed to trace. For a long 
time we hesitated ; the pen dropped from our hand. 
This battle, more sombre than Cressy, or Poitiers, 
or Agincourt ; this defeat, which has no more been 



WATERLOO. 157 



avenged by France than Zama was by Carthage, this 
great national catastrophe, must be related. 

Napoleon had only about one hundred and twenty 
thousand men to oppose to the two hundred and 
thirty thousand composing the armies of Wellington 
and Bliicher. However, he did not despair of suc- 
cess, and he counted on renewing the tactics which 
had proved efficacious so many times already. To 
attack the two armies separately, to surprise the 
Prussians, and then to fall upon the English before 
they should have time to rally their different corps, — 
such was his plan of campaign. During the night of 
June 14-15 an ill-omened event occurred: General 
de Bourmont, followed by five officers, who, like him- 
self, were Bourbon partisans, went over to the enemy. 
" Their names," the Emperor said, later on, " will be 
held in execration so long as the French people form 
a nation. This desertion increased the anxiety of the 
soldiers." On June 15, the French army crossed the 
Sambre, and, in a fiery proclamation. Napoleon re- 
minded his troops that this day was the anniversary 
of Marengo and Friedland. A success of the advance 
guard encouraged them. The English were defend- 
ing Quatre-Bras as a rallying-point, and the Prussians, 
Fleurus and Sombref. On June 16, while Marshal 
Ney failed at Quatre-Bras, the Emperor gained the 
sanguinary battle of Ligny against the Prussians. 
The struggle became ferocious by dint of being stub- 
born. It seemed as if each man recognized his mor- 
tal enemy, and rejoiced because the moment of ven- 



158 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

geance had come. Quarter was neither asked nor 
given., Blucher, who had had a horse killed under 
him, in dismay ordered a retreat. But the untir- 
ing septuagenarian's repulse had not been an utter 
overthrow. The Prussians, who still numbered more 
than ninety thousand combatants, retreated in good 
order, and Marshal Grouchy, whom the Emperor 
ordered to pursue them, had only thirty-two thou- 
sand. Napoleon turning back on the English army 
at Quatre-Bras, Wellington evacuated the position 
and retired to Mont-Saint-Jean, near Waterloo. The 
forest of Soignes extends behind Mont-Saint- Jean. 
The English general drew up against it. The hilly 
character of the ground, which nature has fortified, 
permitted him to maintain a formidable defence. The 
troops on both sides were worn out with fatigue. 
The temperature betokened a storm, and the air was 
heavy, with thirty degrees of heat. In the afternoon 
of June 17, the sky, which had been covered by thick 
clouds, discharged them in torrents of water. At the 
end of a few minutes the whole region was changed 
into a hopeless marsh. The rain kept on all day, 
all night, all the next morning. A solemn and terri- 
ble night was that of June 17-18, which has been 
called "The Vigil of Waterloo." The two armies 
face each other in that feverish expectation which 
precedes decisive battles. No shelter against the 
drenching rain. They stick fast in mud above their 
knees. No moon, no stars. The darkness is pro- 
found, impenetrable. The men lose themselves in 



WATERLOO. 159 



quickset hedges. They stumble against each other 
and fall head over heels down ravines. Curses min- 
gle with the roaring of the wind. The French army 
believed itself already betrayed. 

What must be passing in Napoleon's heart ? What 
is he going to risk, this great gamester, on his final 
throw ? More than his life ; his crown and his lib- 
erty : more than his crown and his liberty ; the 
fortune of France. All these men who will see 
but one more sun, will die for him, for him alone. 
The horizon is all aflame with bivouac fires, as it 
was on the eve of Austerlitz. But they are not 
now omens of good fortune as they were in 1805. 
These lights resemble a conflagration more than 
an apotheosis. Napoleon does not sleep. He had 
been eighteen hours in the saddle on June 15, and 
had slept but three hours before the battle of Ligny. 
On the 16th, he was again for eighteen hours on 
horseback. On the 17th, he rose at five in the 
morning. On the night of the 17th and 18th, it is he 
who makes the reconnoissance, his feet in the mud, 
his head under the bridle-bits. In vain he seeks to 
remind himself of all his victories, to take his former 
attitudes, to make effective speeches as of old. At 
heart he is troubled. To his physical fatigue a moral 
one is added. Once too greedy of emotions, he is 
now sated with them. His officers, his soldiers, are 
not less perplexed than he is. Their devotion is 
boundless, but it assumes the character of rage, 
of frenzy. The chiefs feel themselves still more 



160 ELBA, AND THE HUNBBEB BATS. 

threatened by the balls of a French reaction than by 
those of foreigners. An indescribable moral malady 
torments these men of bronze. The night seems 
long to them. They are in haste to precipitate them- 
selves, heads lowered, into the tempest of fire, to seek 
there a refuge against the torment of their thoughts. 
But all these anxieties, these sufferings, these ago- 
nies, seem to concentrate themselves in a single soul, 
the soul of Napoleon. His eagle eye measures the 
profundity of the abyss. He knows what his defeat 
will be if he is vanquished. And yet his countenance 
betrays no anxiety. He seeks to convey to the minds 
of others a confidence which he does not feel, and, as 
in all great critical moments, he affects serenity and 
imperturbable calm. 

Day is about to break. A few rays of pallid sun- 
light light up the fatal plain. Battle must be given 
at once, before the Prussians have time to come up. 
But the ground is so wet that neither the artillery, 
nor even the cavalry, can take a step. They will 
wait ; and this waiting will be the ruin of the French 
army, whose sole chance would be to crush the Eng- 
lish before the Prussians come. Alas ! how often 
are the desires of man imprudent ! What Napoleon 
desires above all is that Wellington shall not beat 
a retreat. The unfortunate Emperor longs ardently 
for the battle, and the battle will be Waterloo. 

The rain has ceased. In a few hours the ground 
will be practicable again. Napoleon still has illu- 
sions. Having seventy-two thousand men to oppose 



WATERLOO. 161 



to seventy-six thousand seven hundred, he relies on 
his genius to conquer. He would have conquered, 
in fact, if he had been joined by Grouchy instead of 
being outflanked by Bliicher. All depends on that. 
If the English and Prussians make their junction on 
the field, the French army will be destroyed. The 
Emperor will not even admit that such a contingency 
is possible. At half-past eight, when breakfasting, 
he says to the generals surrounding him, *' There are 
ninety chances for us to ten against us." 

The Imperial army moves forward in eleven col- 
umns, and descends from the high grounds it had 
occupied to take up its positions for fighting. These 
eleven columns, which an English historian has com- 
pared to enormous serpents, their scales shining in 
the sunlight, march slowly to the sound of trumpets 
and the beating of drums. The military bands play 
the Chant du depart., and the famous air, Veillons au 
salut de VEminre. It is half-past ten. Napoleon 
passes in front of the troops, who are drunk with 
enthusiasm, and utter frenzied acclamations. 

At half-past eleven, the Emperor gives the signal: 
the cannonading begins. The French take the wood 
of Goumont. The ground has dried up. It will be 
soaked again, not with water, but with blood. 

A few leagues distant, near Ghent, a man who is 
taking a solitary walk through peaceful fields, and 
reading Csesar's Commentaries as he goes, stops to 
listen to some vague, far-off rumbling noise. He 
asks himself whether it is not the rolling of distant 



162 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

thunder, and seeing that the sky is still full of clouds, 
he deliberates whether to continue his walk or return 
before the storm breaks. Again he listens. No 
more noise, unless it be the cry of a waterfowl in the 
rushes, or the striking of a village clock. He goes 
on his way. The rumbling recommences. Is it the 
sound of a battle ? he asks himself. A south wind, 
rising, brings distinctly the distant echo of the detona- 
tion of artillery. Now no more doubt. It is a battle. 
What a striking contrast : here, calm unalterable ; 
a few women weeding among the beans : down yon- 
der the unchaining of a hell, the rain of fire, the hur- 
ricane of howitzers and shells. 

This solitary stroller is a Frenchman, the bitter 
enemy of Napoleon, the author of the brochure, 
Buonaparte et les Bourbons, — Chateaubriand. " Silent 
auditor of the formidable decrees of the Fates," he 
says to us, "I would have been less moved had I 
been in the midst of the melde. The peril, the firing, 
the pressure of death, would have given me no time 
to meditate ; but alone, under a tree in the fields of 
Ghent, as if I were the shepherd of the flocks brows- 
ing around me, the burden of my reflections over- 
powered me." And he adds these noble words in 
which the partisan is silenced by the patriot: "Al- 
though Napoleon's success would mean to me an 
eternal exile, my country at this moment seized pos- 
session of my heart. My wishes were all for the 
oppressor of France, if, in saving our honor he could 
wrest us from foreign domination. Would Welling- 



WATERLOO. 163 



ton triumph ? Then legitimacy would re-enter Paris 
behind these red uniforms which had just re dyed 
their purple in French blood. As the chariots of its 
consecration, royalty should then have ambulance 
wagons filled with our mutilated grenadiers. What 
would a restoration be, accomplished under such 
auspices? I recount but a very small fraction of 
the ideas which tormented me. Every discharge of 
cannon gave me a shock and redoubled the beating 
of my heart." 

At this same moment, Napoleon is experiencing a 
still more violent emotion. Looking constantly in the 
direction whence he hoped to see Grouchy coming, he 
sees on the horizon, near the chapel of Saint Lambert, 
something indeterminate and vague which excites 
first his curiosity and then his fear. " What do you 
see towards Saint Lambert ? " he said to Marshal 
Soult. The Major-General answered : " I think I see 
five or six thousand men. It is probably one of 
Grouchy's detachments." All the glasses of the 
staff are at once levelled on this point. Some think 
they are not troops, but trees ; some that they are 
columns in position ; others that they are troops on 
the march. If so, is it Grouchy or Bliicher? On 
the answer to this question will hang the fate of the 
day. At such a distance it is impossible to distin- 
guish the French uniform from the Prussian, as both 
of them are blue. 

Then the Emperor calls my grandfather. General 
Domon, formerly captain of Murat's Guards, and 



164 ELBA, AND TEE HUNDRED DAYS. 

orders him to make a reconnoissance with his division 
of light artillery, accompanied by that of General 
Subervic. If the troops are French, he will join 
them ; if they are Prussians, he will keep them back. 
At the same time — it is an hour past noon — Napo- 
leon sends a despatch to Grouchy ordering him to 
come up. But will the order reach him in time ? 
And where is Grouchy ? No one knows. At the same 
moment' Marshal Ney attacks La Haye Sainte in an 
attempt to pierce the English centre. A furious 
struggle ensues, but produces no result. At half-past 
two, both armies, as if by a tacit understanding, 
accord each other a momentary truce, like two 
athletes who take time to breathe. The first act of 
the battle is over. They are already a long way off 
from those ninety chances against ten of which the 
Emperor spoke this morning. 

A terrible piece of news reaches Napoleon : Gene- 
ral Domon sends word that there is no longer any 
room for doubt : the troops debouching in the direc- 
tion of Saint Lambert are Prussians ; and Grouchy, 
instead of marching to Waterloo, is going toward 
Wavres. Perhaps this would be the moment to hurl 
all the troops upon the English army, before the 
Prussians arrive. But the great gamester hesitates 
to risk his last stake. He would like to preserve that 
marvellous Imperial Guard which has been so faithful 
to him, which is his pride, his glory. The thought 
that this army of Waterloo is his only one, while the 
military resources of the Coalition are inexhaustible, 



WATERLOO. 165 



paralyzes his audacity. With his last army destroyed, 
what will then be left him. And, even granting a 
victory over the English and Prussians, with what 
shall he resist the innumerable troops of Austria and 
llussia ? 

It is three o'clock. The second act of the battle 
commences. The Emperor sends a brigade of cuiras- 
siers as a reinforcement to Marshal Ney, who is still 
making heroic efforts to penetrate the English centre. 
And behold, without orders, and carried away by an 
instinctive movement, as if by the attraction of I 
know not what irresistible magnet, the Avhole cuiras- 
sier corps follows this brigade. The chasseurs and 
lancers of the Guard move in the same direction. In 
vain the Emperor cries, " It is too soon." The cav- 
alry once started, nothing can arrest its rush. It is a 
torrent which carries everything away. Then begins 
an epic struggle, unexampled perhaps in the military 
annals of any people, a formidable duel of cavalry 
against a whole army, infantry and artillery, aided, 
too, by cavalry equal in numbers to the assailants. 
The Duke of Wellington will say, some years later, 
" I have never seen anything more admirable in war 
than the ten or twelve reiterated charges of the 
French cuirassiers upon troops of all arms." Ney 
has never been more intrepid. It is a miracle that 
this hero of heroes still lives. "Be sure, my friend," 
he says to General Erlon, "that for you and me, if 
we do not die here under the English balls, nothing 
remains but to fall miserably under those of the ^mi- 



166 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



gres." Wellington is not less heroic. His tenacity 
is unshakable. To an officer who asks for instruc- 
tions in case he should be slain, he answers : " I have 
no instructions to give ; there is only one thing to 
be done — to fight to the last man and the last 
moment." 

It is five in the evening. In spite of its furious 
charges, in spite of its gigantic efforts, the French 
cavalry cannot accomplish the impossible. It de- 
mands the infantry of the Guard, it demands the Em- 
peror. Napoleon still hesitates. Physical sufferings 
come to add to his perplexities. He can hardly sit 
upon his horse. Instead of multiplying himself, as 
he had been used to on battle-fields where his presence 
diffused emulation and enthusiasm, he remains mo- 
tionless, suffering so much that he falls at times into 
a sort of lethargy. What a gradation in the senti- 
ments, which ever since morning have taken posses- 
sion of his soul! At first, confidence, illusion, the 
intoxication of battle ; then, suddenly, doubt, fear, 
augmenting from hour to hour, from minute to 
minute, the face which grows troubled, which at one 
moment becomes paler than a corpse ; then the fright- 
ful truth appearing in its full proportions, the last 
hope crumbling, then cataclysm, overthrow, annihi-. 
lation. 

Grouchy does not arrive. Is he guilty ? No. His 
instructions were obscure. The officer sent to meet 
him did not join him soon enough. In marching 
toward Wavres, the unfortunate Marshal thought he 



WATERLOO. 167 



was acting in accordance with the mind as well as 
with the formal orders of the Emperor. He may 
have been mistaken, but he was so in good faith ; and 
history, if it is just, will incriminate his loyalty no 
more than his courage. His highest ambition would 
have been the fate of Desaix. But, alas ! the star of 
Marengo no longer shone. 

Ah! what tortures, what anguish in the heart of 
Napoleon, that Titan thunder-stricken ! The fatal 
moment has come when he must throw his last 
card upon the gaming-table, the card which means 
despair. Sixty-five thousand Prussians inundate the 
battle-field. They come to act in concert with fifty- 
five thousand Anglo-Germans. There remain only 
fifty thousand Frenchmen able to combat these one 
hundred and twenty thousand enemies. The infantry 
of the Guard are going to charge. The last act of 
the battle opens. 

" All, those of Friedland and those of Rivoli, 
Knowing that on this holiday they were about to die, 
Saluted their divinity, erect amid the storm. 
One cry, ' Long live the Emperor ! ' the last their pale lips form. 
Then, with the music on ahead, all passionless and slow, 
And smiling at the English guns black yawning there below, 
The Imperial Guard went forward into the furnace flame." 

Calm, silent, not firing a single gun, they cross the 
plateau, and march against the English lines. They 
are wiped out by cannon and musketry : out of the 
two thousand nine hundred heroes who offered this 
supreme attack, hardly eight hundred are left stand- 



168 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



ing. It is nearly eight o'clock. All is over. The 
Emperor has lost the battle. 

"They went, all armed, front high, grave, stoical. 
Not one shrank back. Sleep, dead heroical ! 
Their waiting comrades, wavering in their place. 
Beheld the Old Guard perish. — Then, with face 
All pale and scared. Disaster raised her voice 
Despairing — giant she, with moments choice 
To fright battalions haughty, and to change 
Their flags to tatters — spectre made of smoke 
Who as she rises grows — Disaster broke 
On every soldier's gaze, to every man, 
Wringing her hands and crying, * 'Scape who can ! ' " ^ 

Marshal Ney, hatless, his sword broken in his 
hand, his clothes ragged with bullet-holes, — takes a 
handful of men with him, and flings himself once 
more into the mel^e. " Come on, my friends," he 
cries ; " see how a marshal of France dies." Alas ! 
the hero will not die upon the battle-field. 

Napoleon, owning himself vanquished, has just 
given the signal to retreat. It was to render that 
possible, and to avert the utter extermination of 
what had been the French army, that the veterans 
of the Guard had given themselves to death like the 
Spartans at Thermopylae. The four or five squares 
of this heroic infantry in the midst of one hundred 
and twenty thousand enemies, resemble, as the nat- 
ional historian has said, the summits of a rock which 
the furious ocean is covering with foam. The Guard 
dies, and does not surrender ! 

1 Victor Hugo, Les Chcttiments. 



WATERLOO. 169 



A patriotic painter, Hippolyte Bellang^, whose 
radiant canvas, La Revue au Carrousel, has so well 
represented the joyous and triumphant army, has 
depicted the death agony of the Imperial Guard in 
one of the most striking pictures that exist. This 
painting, lugubrious and doleful, makes one shudder. 
The sky is sombre, gloomy — one of Gericault's skies. 
Behind a rampart of English corpses, in red uniforms, 
three grenadiers of the Guard still stand erect. One 
of them is firing his last shot. Another, making a 
furious gesture, shakes his clinched hand at the 
enemy. The third lifts his arms to heaven and cries 
once more, " Long live the Emperor ! " The pen 
would essay in vain to describe what there is of 
ferocious energy, grandiose wrath, and heroic despair 
in the haughty attitudes and contracted features of 
these three veterans, dying as they had lived. Ill, 
and already himself taken possession of by the shad- 
ows of death, Hippolyte Bellang^ collected all his 
forces to create this canvas, the testament, as it were, 
of his talent, so military and so French. 

Honor to the grenadiers of the Guard, to the 
soldiers, men of the people, who have pushed further 
back the boundaries of devotion, courage, and the 
spirit of sacrifice ! Their blood will be fruitful. In 
the eyes of posterity they will have elevated a defeat 
to the level of the most famous victories. Like the 
martyrs of religion, these martyrs of glory will have 
triumphed even unto death. Gloria victis ! 

And Napoleon, where is he ? The shadows of twi- 



170 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

light have overspread the plain. He is no longer 
seen. Some say that he is wounded, others that he 
is slain. The soldiers, no longer feeling themselves 
protected by his genius, break their ranks. There 
are some who blow out their brains, unwilling to 
survive defeat. Later on he will say, " Waterloo ! 
Waterloo ! It is there I should have died." Like 
Ney, he has not succeeded in getting killed. Sur- 
rounded by a square of grenadiers of the Guard, 
under command of Major Martenot, he is marching 
pell-mell with a crowd of wounded in the midst of 
a handful of veterans who make a rampart for him 
of their bodies. A few days later Wellington will 
write : " I cannot express with what regret and 
sadness I look around me. The dear-bought glory 
which follows such actions does, not console. ... In 
truth, the losses I have experienced have so beaten 
and broken me down, that I have not courage to 
rejoice over the advantages we have obtained." If 
the victor speaks thus, what must the vanquished 
say, when the vanquished is Napoleon? To the 
joyous music played by the bands this morning must 
succeed the De profundis, the Dies irce^ the lamenta- 
tions of Jeremiah. What reflections must not he who 
had been the victor of Austerlitz have made at this 
moment on the pitifulness of ambition, the caprices 
of fortune, the immense share which is left to chance 
in earthly things, on the slender thread on which 
hang the occurrences of this world ! A secret voice, 
more eloquent than that of any of the sermonizers 



WATERLOO. 171 



who have exhorted against pride, was whispering in 
the fugitive's soul. The saying of the Gospel veri- 
fied itself, " For all they who take the sword shall 
perish by the sword." They say that the man of 
bronze wept. To deplore such a catastrophe, would 
an ocean of tears suffice 1 



XI 



NAPOLEON II. 



THE battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday, 
June 18, 1815. On that day the Parisians were 
reading in the Moniteur the proclamation of June 14, 
in which the Emperor had said to his army : "Sol- 
diers, to-day is the anniversary of Marengo and of 
Friedland, which twice decided the destiny of Eu- 
rope. Then, as after Austerlitz and Wagram, we 
were too generous ; we believed the protestations 
and oaths of the Princes whom we left on their 
thrones. To-day, however, having combined among 
themselves, they seek to attack the independence of 
France and her most sacred rights. They have be- 
gun the most unjust aggressions. Let us go to meet 
them ! Neither they nor we are any longer the same 
men ! '* 

On Monday, June 19, — O irony of fate ! — a hun- 
dred discharges of cannon from the Invalides an- 
nounced a victory to the Parisians, — alas ! a victory 
already old, — that of Ligny. The same day the 
Ghent Moniteur published the following: "The 18th 
ended, in the happiest manner, for the Allies, the 
172 



NAPOLEON II. 17; 



sanguinary and bitterly contested struggle which 
had lasted since the 15th. Bonaparte's army, French 
in liame only, since it is the terror and scourge of 
the country, has been vanquished and almost utterly 
destroyed." 

The immediate consequences of the battle of 
Waterloo were no less disastrous than the battle it- 
self. Even nightfall did not interrupt the carnage. 
While the English army, worn out with fatigue, 
betook themselves to rest, the Prussian cavalry pur- 
sued relentlessly the flying French troops. The ris- 
ing of the moon facilitated this man-hunt. At Ligny 
the Imperial Guard had cried " No quarter ! " and 
now the same cry came back upon them like the 
penalty of retaliation. Cannons, military wagons, 
baggage, obstacles of all sorts, made their road diffi- 
cult. The confusion, disorder, and terror were in- 
expressible. History offers few examples of such an 
overwhelming disaster. At Charleroy the Emperor 
left his brother Jerome, whose conduct at Waterloo 
had been heroic, in command of the remnants of the 
army, and posted to Paris, where he knew that the 
Royalists, believing his sword broken, would like to 
break also his crown and sceptre. 

The joyful salvos of artillery, fired by the cannon 
of the Invalides on June 19, had not reassured the 
Parisian population. Vague presentiments oppressed 
all minds. Towards six in the evening of June 20, 
an aide-de-camp of Marshal Davout, Colonel Michel, 
who had been sent by him for tidings, and had been 



174 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

present at the end of the battle of Waterloo, arrived 
in Paris at full speed, and announced the disaster to 
the Marshal. " I would have you shot for bringing 
me such news if I did not know you," cried the 
defender of Hamburg, roughly. And the Colonel 
answered, " Please God you might have me shot, if 
that would alter the case." 

In the morning of June 21, Napoleon re-entered 
the Elys^e, whence he had departed on the 12th. 
How much had happened in those nine days ! Ah ! 
how much reason he had had for the fear he ex- 
pressed to General Bertrand's wife, at the moment of 
departure, lest he might come to regret the Island of 
Elba. What a difference between the return from 
Waterloo and the return from Marengo, Austerlitz, 
Jena, and Wagram ! When he stopped at the flight 
of steps leading to the Elysde, General Drouot, who 
had just left the carriage with him, could not refrain 
from exclaiming, "All is lost!" Napoleon answered 
quickly, " Except honor." It was the first time he 
had spoken since quitting Laon. Leaning on the 
arm of Caulaincourt, who had hastened to meet him, 
he slowly ascended the staircase. " I need two 
hours' rest," he said, " in order to be able to think of 
my affairs. I am stifling ! a bath ! let them bring me 
a bath!" 

At the Palais-Bourbon, although the Chamber of 
Deputies did not begin its session until noon, the 
greater part of the members had been on hand since 
morning, to receive news and talk about the situa- 



NAPOLEON II. 175 



tion. Fouch^ had said of the Emperor, "This un- 
bridled gamester no longer knows even how to win a 
game ; and what is to be done now with a pla}- er 
who can only lose ? " Napoleon was going to be 
betrayed by men as he had been by fortune. The 
consequences of Waterloo were to make it resemble 
the battle of Zama, not that of Cannae. 

Here begins the death agony of the Empire. It 
will not be less lamentable than the agony of Roy- 
alty. Napoleon, this genius so haughty, so resolute, 
so pre-eminently the man of action, the former arbiter 
of destiny, the Emperor of the eagle glance, the soul 
of fire and the will of iron, is about to show himself 
as undecided, as feeble, as timid, as the martyr-king. 
M. Alfred Nettement has made the same remark in his 
excellent Histoire de la Restauration : "Here is a 
man," he says, " who had led the world by a glance, a 
nod ; who had kneaded Europe with his hands ; before 
whom France had slain itself for years. But, the cir- 
cumstances changing, the talisman of victory having 
been broken abroad by Providence in the hands of 
the conqueror, and the force of opinion which had 
rendered all things easy and possible altering toward 
him at home, the same man is feebleness itself: he 
can do nothing against any one, and everything can 
be done against him. Fouche lords it over him ; 
Manuel braves him; Lafayette imperiously demands 
his abdication ; the Chamber of the Hundred Days, 
which certainly had nothing in common with the 
Convention, threatens to depose him, and gives him 



176 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

but an hour to make his abdication. Louis XVI. 
was not more helpless, more inert, more inactive 
against his enemies. Let no one answer that Louis 
XVI. had not lost the battle of Waterloo ; he had 
lost the battle of the seventeenth century against the 
eighteenth, of the monarchy against revolution, of 
religion against unbelief." 

What a lesson for human pride is this impotence 
of Napoleon ! And how Providence makes us as it 
were touch with our hands the nothingness of those 
things which men proudly call genius and glory, and 
which count for so little before the decrees of the 
Eternal! The Emperor in the Elys^e is not less 
humiliated than the King in the Temple, and he is 
more to be pitied ; for, in his misfortune he does not 
look toward the Crucifix ! 

After taking a few moments of repose, Napoleon 
held a council on that very morning of June 21. "If 
the nation rises," said he, "the enemy will be de- 
stroyed. If, instead of such a rising and a resort to 
extraordinary measures, we begin disputing, all is 
lost. The enemy is in France ; in order to save the 
country I need great powers — a temporary dictator- 
ship. I could seize it in the interest of the country, 
but it will be more useful and more national to have 
it given me by the Chambers." Alas 1 the Emperor 
will not be treated by the Chambers as the Consul 
Varro was by the Roman Senate. Carnot alone sup- 
ported the idea of a dictatorship. The former Con- 
ventionist bethought himself of the fourteen armies 



NAPOLEON II. 177 



of the French Republic. But he obtained no follow- 
ers. The flame of 1792 was burnt out. Paris had 
no desire to imitate Saragossa. The unfortunate 
Emperor saw the traces of absolute discouragement 
upon the faces of his ministers. Regnault de Saint- 
Jean d'Angely, one of his most faithful adherents, 
suggested, in respectful terms, an abdication in favor 
of the King of Rome. But listen to Lucien Bona- 
parte, a member of the Council : " The assembly was 
very disorderly. An abdication in favor of the King 
of Rome was proposed as delicately as possible. — 
'The Bourbons would be preferable to my son,' said 
Napoleon ; ' they are French, to say the least.' I am 
not one of those who find this reply admirable," adds 
Lucien. " At that moment nothing was more French 
than his son." 

But, no matter what Lucien may say. Napoleon 
was not deceived. He knew that his son was the 
prisoner of the Coalition, and that the Coalition would 
not loose its prey. As to Marie Louise, he was only 
too certain that he had nothing to expect from her. 
"They tell you," he exclaimed, "that the King of 
Rome, under the regency of his mother, would be 
admissible. It is a perfidious fable, invented at 
Vienna and circulated in Paris so as to bring about 
our ruin. I know what is going on at Vienna, and 
that my wife and son would not be accepted at any 
price. They want the Bourbons and nothing but the 
Bourbons, and it is entirely natural. When I am got 
rid of, they will march on Paris, re-enter it, and pro 



178 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

claim the Bourbons. Do you want them ? For my 
part, I don't know that they are not preferable to 
anything else I see." In vain the Emperor developed, 
in glowing terms, the resources he could still draw 
from the soil of France; in vain he described the 
prodigies which might be accomplished by union and 
perseverance. He convinced no one. They would 
decide on nothing. They would await events. 

What was going on at the same time in the Cham- 
ber of Deputies ? After a silence which had lasted 
twenty-three years, Lafayette, the friend of Wash- 
ington, the leader of 1789, the prisoner of Olmutz, 
ascended the tribune. "When for the first time, 
after so many years," said he, " I lift a voice which 
the old friends of liberty will recognize again, I feel 
myself called to speak to you of the dangers of the 
country, which you alone have now the power to 
save. Sinister rumors have been circulated ; unfortu- 
nately, they are confirmed. Now is the moment for 
us to rally around the old tricolored standard — that 
of '89, of liberty, equality, and public order. It is 
that alone which we have to defend against foreign 
pretensions and internal attempts. Permit, gentle- 
man, a veteran of this sacred cause, who was always 
a stranger to party-spirit, to submit to you some pre- 
liminary resolutions whose necessity I hope you will 
approve." 

Then he demanded that the Chamber should de- 
clare itself permanently constituted, and consider any 
attempt to dissolve it a crime of high treason ; also. 



NAPOLEON II. 179 



that the Ministers of War, the Interior, and Police 
should be requested to report at once to the As- 
sembly. 

" The anachronism of this discourse," Chateau- 
briand has said, "caused a momentary illusion. It 
seemed as though the Revolution, personified in La- 
fayette, had issued from the tomb and presented 
itself, pallid and wrinkled, on the platform." And 
yet this revolutionary motion, essentially unconstitu- 
tional because it deprived the sovereign of one of the 
chief prerogatives of the crown, the right of disso- 
lution, was accepted without a contest by the Cham- 
ber, already faithless to the oaths taken but a few 
days before. 

What will the Emperor do when he learns of 
this resolution which is equivalent to a deposition ? 
Napoleon wavers ; his soul is troubled with uncer- 
tainties, fluctuations, contradictions. Now he is 
elated, now cast down ; to anger, recriminations, 
invectives, and menaces, succeeds silence ; to the 
over-excitement of a man who, remembering his glory, 
perhaps believes himself still capable of miracles, the 
anguish of a condemned wretch who feels the earth 
failing beneath his feet and sees the abyss open. He 
knows that if he gives orders they will not be obeyed. 
His voice, which once made the universe tremble, 
now intimidates no one. The giant of battles has 
become as inoffensive as a child. He has less in- 
fluence than Fouche, the Conventionist, the regicide. 
He counts for nothing any more. He can hardly 
believe his eyes and ears. 



180 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 

At Elba he was still adored. At the Elys^e he is 
but a phantom. He reminds one of Bossuet's ser- 
mon against ambition, a sermon which is like a 
prophecy; "Behold a man so fortunate that a cen- 
tury sees not many like him ; and then behold his ruin 
and his fall. Because he has risen up so arrogantly, 
and lifted his head even to the clouds, and because 
his heart is inflated with pride, for that reason, saith 
the Lord, I will cut him down by the roots ; I will 
prostrate him with a great blow and level him to 
earth; he shall become a disgrace and be no longer 
able to sustain himself ; he shall fall with a mighty 
overthrow. All those who reposed beneath his shadow 
shall leave him in fear of being crushed beneath his 
ruins. And yet they shall see him lying at full 
length upon the mountain, a useless burden to the 
earth." Fatal hour for the conqueror ! It is him- 
self who no longer believes in the first Napoleon — 
who does not even believe in the second Napoleon. 
It is for form's sake only that he consents to defend 
his son's cause. He knows that it is as irrevocably 
lost as his own. He smiles bitterly at the last illu- 
sions concerning the dynasty, still entertained by two 
or three faithful- adherents, who are trying to cling 
to the floating wreckage of a sunken ship. Death 
would be a refuge for him ; but he had already tried 
to kill himself at Fontainebleau, in 1814, and with- 
out succeeding. A second attempt at suicide would 
be only a clumsy imitation. He must live to suffer, 
live to expiate. His destiny weighs on him like a 



NAPOLEON II. 181 



cloak of lead. This man, once so full of his all-power- 
ful personality, would like to flee from himself, to 
lose, if possible, the consciousness of his identity. 
He is about to let himself drift, like a drowning man 
who, after having swum with all his might, and 
reached the limit of his strength, contends no longer 
with the waves, but abandons himself to them. The 
athlete, once indefatigable, feels himself at last van- 
quished by that supreme power which atheists call 
the force of things, and which the faithful call Provi- 
dence. 

His brother Lucien vainly counselled him to resist 
the insolent resolution of the Chamber of Deputies. 
The following dialogue took place between them : — 

Lucien. " Where is your firmness ? Overcome this 
irresolution. You know what it will cost you not to 
dare." 

Napoleon. " I have dared only too much." 

" Too much or too little. Dare for the last time." 

" An Eighteenth Brumaire ?" 

" Not at all. A thoroughly constitutional decree. 
The Constitution gives you that right." 

" They will not respect the Constitution, and they 
will oppose the decree." 

" Better still ; in that case they are rebels, and you 
dissolve them." 

" The National Guard will come to their aid." 

" The National Guard has only a resisting force ; 
when it comes to action, the shopkeepers will think 
of their wives and their shops." 



182 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

" An Eighteenth Brumaire which should not suc- 
ceed might lead to a Thirteenth Vendemiare." 

"You are deliberating when you ought to act. 
They act and don't deliberate." 

" What can they do? They are talkers." 
" Opinion is on their side. They will pronounce 
your deposition." 

" My deposition ? Would they dare ? " 
" They will dare everything if you dare nothing." 
While the two brothers were talking thus, the 
neighborhood of the Elysee was filling up with an 
immense crowd of patriots, unwilling to despair, and 
who, perceiving the Emperor, greeted him with fren- 
zied acclamations. The Avenue Marigny was thronged 
with common people and former soldiers, in whom 
the national chord was vibrating. They implored 
Napoleon to lead them against the enemy. They 
received him with as much enthusiasm as in the days 
of his greatest triumphs. And he, greatly moved, 
could not refrain from saying : " What do these peo- 
ple owe me ? I found them poor and have left them 
so." 

Away with you, ungrateful courtiers ! Away, men 
of the old regime whom Napoleon has endowed, en- 
riched, overwhelmed with favors ! Away, chamber- 
lains who grimace and call your former master, 
Buonaparte ! It is in the cabins of the people that 
patriotism and honor will take refuge. 

The common people who have suffered so much 
from Napoleon and for him; the poor women who 



NAPOLEON 11. 183 



have given him the lives of their sons ; the veterans 
whose bodies are covered with wounds on his account ; 
the poor peasants who have been ruined by the in- 
vasion; yes, all those who have suffered, all who 
have wept, not only pardon their Emperor, but still 
console and glorify him in his misfortunes. The 
nobles, on the other hand, with a few honorable ex- 
ceptions, deny him even before the cock has crowed ! 

The shouts redoubled. " Well ! " cried Lucien. 
"Do you hear these people? It is the same thing 
all over France. . . . Will you abandon them to fac- 
tions?" Napoleon, pausing, replied by a gesture of 
the hand to the enthusiasm of the crowd. " Am I 
more than man," said he, " that I should be able to 
bring back a thousand misguided deputies to the 
unity which alone can save us ? Or am I a miserable 
partisan chief, willing to kindle unavailing civil war? 
No ; never. In Brumaire it was our duty to draw 
the sword for the welfare of France ; to-day we should 
throw the sword away. Go and try to pacify the 
Chambers ; I can do everything with them ; I could 
do a great deal without them in my own behalf, but I 
could not save the country. Go ; but I forbid you, 
above all, in going out, to harangue these people who 
are asking me to arm them. I will attempt every- 
thing for France, but nothing for myself." 

Lucien, in company with the Ministers, started for 
the Chamber of Deputies, passing in silence through 
the tumultuous sea of people. At the Palais Bourbon 
he ascended the tribune. " Do not let us enter the trap 



184 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

which the foreigners have spread for our credulity," 
he cried. " Their aim is to disunite us so as to con- 
quer." He added that the French nation had always 
heen accused of lacking- perseverance, and that the 
moment had now arrived either to refute or to justify 
this reproach ; if they did not imitate the conduet of 
Spain, Russia, and Germany toward their sovereigns, 
history would rank them inferior to the Spaniards, 
the Germans, and the Russians. 

Lafayette, rising in his seat, replied ; " The accu- 
sation just made is calumnious. By what right does 
the last speaker dare to accuse the nation of levity, 
and of lacking in perseverance toward the Emperor 
Napoleon? It has followed him through the sands 
of Egypt and the deserts of Russia; through fifty 
battle-fields ; in successes and in reverses, and it is 
for having followed him that we have to regret the 
blood of three millions of Frenchmen." 

Manuel insisted on the necessity of distinguishing 
the cause of the country from that of a man. Another 
deputy, M. Jay, demanded an abdication. The Cham- 
ber nominated a committee to devise measures for 
the public safety; in reality, to assume executive 
powers. It was composed of five members : Lanjui- 
nais. General Grenier, Lafayette, Flaugergues, and 
Dupont de I'Eure, to whom five others, chosen by 
the Chamber of Peers, were to be added. The 
latter assembly selected three generals, — Andr^ossy, 
Drouot, and Dejean ; and two former Conventionists, 
■ — Boissy-d'Anglas and Thibaudeau. 



NAPOLEON 11. 186 



Lucien and the Ministers were no better received 
by the Chamber of Peers than they had been by the 
Chamber of Deputies. Everybody felt that an abdi- 
cation, or, failing that, a deposition, was imminent. 
And yet it was but a few days since the Chamber of 
Peers had said in its address to Napoleon : " The in- 
terests of France are inseparable from yours. If suc- 
cess does not attend your efforts, reverses. Sire, will 
not lessen our constancy, and will redouble our at- 
tachment to you." And at the same time the Cham- 
ber of Deputies had said : " Resuming to-day the 
exercise of her rights, and rallying around the hero 
to whom she confides anew the government of the 
State, France cannot admit the distinctions by which 
the Allied Powers seek to veil their aggression. To 
attack the monarchy of its choice is to attack the 
independence of the nation." What did all these 
promises, all these fine speeches, amount to? They 
were empty phrases and nothing more. 

Returning to the Elys^e, Lucien bluntly told his 
brother that no alternative was possible except a coup 
cVetat or an abdication. Napoleon hesitated. Silent 
and motionless, he was awaiting the decree of fate in 
a sort of torpor. During the night the Committee of 
Ten appointed by the two Chambers assembled. They 
decided to send to the camp of the Coalition a com- 
mittee of negotiators, who should present themselves, 
not in the name of the Emperor, but in that of the 
Chambers. It amounted, in fact, to a deposition ; it 
was the thing if not the word. Napoleon no longer 
either reigned or governed. 



186 ELBA, AND THE HUNBBED BAYS. 

The next morning, Thursday, June 22, 1815, every- 
body waked with the instinctive conviction that the 
end was near. The agony was almost over ; the death 
bell was about to toll. And still Napoleon had a 
faint glimmer of hope. He had learned that the 
troops under Marshal Grouchy, — thirty thousand 
men, — who were believed to have perished, were safe, 
and that the survivors of Waterloo were gathering at 
Laon. For a moment the man of battles thought of 
drawing his sword ' from its scabbard. It was too 
late. The Empire was to have its Tenth of August 
— and a Tenth of August when even its defenders 
would not fight. 

The Chamber of Deputies had been in session 
since morning. Wavering and impatient, they com- 
plained because the unhappy Emperor had not yet 
signed his abdication. The}^ were afraid of an Eigh- 
teenth Brumaire. The comparatively favorable news 
from the army disturbed instead of rejoicing them. 
They noisily demanded his abdication; they must 
absolutely have it at once, without any reservation or 
condition whatsoever. Lafayette instructed Regnault 
de Saint-Jean-d'Angely to go and tell Napoleon that 
he would be given an hour in which to abdicate, and 
that if he had not done so by that time, he would be 
deposed. The session was suspended. Even Lucien 
no longer counselled his brother to resist. It was fin- 
ished. Consummatum est 

For a moment the man who was about to cease to 
be Emperor revolted against the insolent impatience 



NAPOLEON 11. 187 



of the Chamber. " They want me to abdicate," he 
exclaimed bitterly. "To-morrow there will be no 
army. If they had rejected me when I landed at 
Cannes, I could have understood it. To have thrown 
me aside fifteen days ago might have been courage, 
but to-day it is cowardice." For an instant the blood 
rose to his face. "No," said he, "I will not abdicate. 
The Chamber is composed of Jacobins, hot-headed 
pretenders who want places and hope to profit by dis- 
order. I ought to denounce them to the country and 
turn them out neck and heels. The time lost may 
be repaired." But this brief instant of anger and ex- 
altation gave place to utter dejection. Napoleon 
quieted down. The urgency of his advisers re 
doubled: "It was never my intention to refuse to 
abdicate," he said with a calm sadness. "I have been 
a soldier, and I will again become one. But I want 
to be let alone to think it over quietly in the interest 
of France and of my son. Tell these gentlemen to 
wait." Alas ! this was the final throe of his agony. 
The Chambers would not grant even another moment 
to their sovereign. What torture ! To abdicate like 
this; to abdicate, not before a formidable Assembly 
like the Convention, able to gather fourteen armies, 
and make all the sovereigns tremble, but before a 
mean and miserable Assembly, a moribund Assembly 
which has itself but a few remaining hours of life ! 
And yet it must be done. Overpowered by destiny, 
Napoleon bowed his* head, and at the moment when 
he took the pen with which he was to sign the fatal 



188 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



act, he felt so discouraged that he did not even think 
of mentioning his son's name. 

Listen to Lucien's revelations concerning this : " It 
was so little a question of his personal interest, and 
that of his family, that at first he dictated his abdicar 
tion without speaking of his son ; and when Carnot 
and I reminded him that, at least, he ought not to 
abdicate except in favor of Napoleon II., in order to 
eliminate the Bourbons, he replied, ' The Bourbons I 
What of it ? At least they would not be under the 
Austrian ferule.' Such a sentiment from such a man 
needs no commentary ; he smiled at the importance 
w@ attached to his appointing his son. * The enemies 
are there,' said he, ' and the Bourbons with them. 
We must either repulse the first or submit to the 
second. United, we might still be able to save our- 
selves ; divided, there is no resource except the Bour- 
bons. As to me, my fate concerns nobody ; I know 
adversity.' Nevertheless, we induced him to abdi- 
cate in his son's favor, but he did it without sharing 
our illusions, and as a thing of very slight impor- 
tance." 

The abdication so much desired hy the Assembly, 
and which was to be its own abdication as well as 
that of Napoleon, was signed between midday and 
one o'clock. It is in these words : " Frenchmen, in 
beginning a war to uphold our national independ- 
ence, I counted on the union of all efforts and all 
wills, and on the support of all the national authori- 
ties. I was justified in hoping for success, and I 



NAPOLEON II. 189 



braved all the declarations of the Powers against me. 
The circumstances appear to me to have changed. I 
offer myself in sacrifice to the hatred of the enemies 
of France. May it be that their declarations are sin- 
cere, and that they bear ill will to me only ! My 
political life is ended, and I proclaim my son, under 
the title of Napoleon II., Emperor of the French. 
The Ministers will form provisionally the Council of 
the Government. The interest I take in my son 
obliges me to request the Chambers to pass at once a 
law organizing the Regency. Let all unite for the 
public safety and in order to remain an independent 
nation. June 22. [Signed] Napoleon." 

It was nearly one o'clock when the abdication was 
carried by Carnot to the Chamber of Peers, and by 
Fouch^ to the Chamber of Deputies. In this latter 
Assembly, the reading of this act, so impatiently 
desired, moved even the Emperor's enemies. The 
Chamber decided that " a deputation, composed of its 
president and other officers, should wait on Napoleon 
Bonaparte, and express to him the gratitude and 
respect with which they accept the noble sacrifice he 
has made to the independence and happiness of the 
French people." It is eas}^ to understand what the 
Emperor must have suffered in receiving this deputa- 
tion, whose action resembled irony more than defer- 
ence. In his Memoirs, Lafayette, while rendering 
homage to the dignified attitude of Napoleon, insists 
on the so-called majesty of this deputation of which 
he was a member : '' It was an imposing: spectacle," 



190 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

he says, " this arrival of nine representatives of the 
people, strong in the respect due to a National 
Assembly, and coming to announce to him, who, 
after having mastered all the sovereigns of the con- 
tinent, still commanded the French army, his Guard, 
and a great party in the faubourgs, that he was no 
longer Emperor, and that the nation resumed the 
government." 

A legitimist historian has laid stress upon the pue- 
rility of this unseasonable outburst of parliamentary 
pride : " Human vanity, even in noble hearts," says 
M. Alfred Nettement, " is subject to strange illusions. 
Otherwise, General Lafayette would have compre- 
hended that these nine representatives of an Assem- 
bly full of the remnants of '93, elected by several 
millions of voters formerly picked out by Napoleon, 
and this time inspired by Fouche whose influence 
had been supreme in the half-deserted electoral col- 
leges, represented nothing but that Assembly, its 
petty passions, pretensions, and vanities, and cut a 
very poor figure before this Emperor who had aban- 
doned himself after having been abandoned by for- 
tune. ... It is difficulty, it is danger, which make 
an action grand, and in the action just performed by 
the Chamber there was neither difficulty nor danger." 

Napoleon received the deputation from the Assem- 
bly with calm and dignified indifference. " I thank 
you," said he; "I desire that my abdication may 
assure the welfare of France, but I do not hope it." 
He terminated thus his brief allocution: "There is 



NAPOLEON II. 191 



no question of me, but only of my son and France. 
Believe me, be united." Then he bowed to the mem- 
bers of the deputation, who retired in profound emo- 
tion. Shortly after their departure he learned that 
the Chamber of Representatives, instead of proclaim- 
ing Napoleon II. and instituting the Regency, had 
appointed an executive committee without saying a 
word about the Empire and imperial institutions. 
Then he exclaimed : " I did not abdicate in favor of 
a new Directory ; I abdicated in favor of my son ; if 
they do not proclaim him, my abdication is null and 
void. It is not by crawling on the ground before the 
Allies that the Chambers can force them to recognize 
the national independence." 

Meantime, scenes really tragical were passing in the 
Chamber of Peers. The man who uttered the most 
gloomy, most despairing words was the incomparable 
hero of the retreat from Russia, Marshal Ney, who, 
only four days before, had fought like a lion at Water- 
loo. Carnot had just read from the tribune a report 
exaggerating the military resources yet remaining to 
France. Ney arose. " The report is false," he cried ; 
"false in every way. Grouchy cannot at most have 
more than twenty-five thousand men under his com- 
mand. There is no longer a soldier of the Guard 
to rally : I commanded them ; I saw them all mas- 
sacred before I left the field of battle. The enemy 
is at Nivelle with eighty thousand men; they can 
reach Paris in six days : there is no way to save the 
country except by opening negotiations. I owe the 



192 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

truth to my country. I am not one of those who con- 
sult their private interest alone. What can I gain 
by the return of Louis XVIII. ? To be shot." Alas ! 
this hero of heroes knew not how truly he spoke. 

Lucien ascended the tribune. Treating a popular 
monarchy just as if it were a monarchy by divine 
right, he recalled the ancient formula, ''The King 
is dead. Live the King!" "The Emperor abdi- 
cates. Live the Emperor ! " he cried. But his voice 
found little or no echo. He took his oath to Napo- 
leon II. No one imitated his example. Later, he 
avowed himself that the imperial cause was lost. 
"At the time," he writes, "the abdication seemed 
disastrous to me, and I used all my feeble efforts to 
avert it; I thought and said then what many French- 
men still think and say ; to me, at least, it appeared 
an act of weakness. But now, being calmer, and 
having long and thoroughly studied the man and 
the act, I have greatly changed my opinion. . . . 
That which was honorable, chivalrous, royal, for 
Louis XVIIL, would have been cruel, infamous, 
sacrilegious for Napoleon ; he was bound to abdicate 
the throne by the very sentiment which made him 
accept it. He would have been culpable if, for the 
sake of defending his throne or that of his son, he 
had braved civil war ; and since, rightly or wrongly, 
he did not think himself able to save France without 
the Chambers, it was his duty to yield to the Cham- 
bers which, by a word, he could have overthrown." 

General Lab^doyere, however, seeing that the 



NAPOLEON 11. 193 



rights of Napoleon II. were not recognized, cried 
out in violent anger; "I heard voices salute the 
successful sovereign ; but now when he is in trouble 
they are far away. There are some who are unwill- 
ing to recognize Napoleon II. because they want to 
submit to the rule of foreigners to whom they give 
the name of Allies. Napoleon's abdication is indivis- 
ible. If his son is not recognized, he should grasp 
the sword, surrounded by Frenchmen who have shed 
their blood for him and who are still covered with 
wounds. He will be abandoned by certain vile gen- 
erals who have already betrayed him. But if it is 
proclaimed that every Frenchman who deserts his 
flag shall be covered with infamy, his house torn 
down, and his family proscribed, there Avill be no 
more traitors, no more of the manoeuvres which 
caused the last catastrophe, and some of whose au- 
thors are probably sitting here." At these inflamed 
words the Peers grew pale with rage. " Order ! 
order ! " was shouted on all sides. " Young man, 
you forget yourself," said Marshal Massena. " You 
think you are still in the guard-house," said Lameth. 
In all this there is, as Chateaubriand has remarked, 
a nameless something which recalls those terrible 
revolutionary scenes during the great days of our 
adversities, when the poniard went round the tri- 
bunal in the hands of the victims. He writes : 
" Some warriors whose fatal fascination has brought 
on the ruin of France by determining the second for- 
eign invasion, were disputing together on the thresh- 



194 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

old of the palace. Their prophetic despair, their 
gestures, their words from beyond the tomb, seemed 
to announce a triple death, — death to themselves, 
death to the man whom they had blessed, death to 
the race they had proscribed." 

Nothing will discourage the legionaries of the 
vanquished, dethroned, and imprisoned Cgesar. The 
white flag will reappear, but the common soldiers 
will hide their bitterness and their hopes beneath 
their thatched roofs, and proud of their glorious 
wounds, will recite to listening peasants the exploits 
of the tricolor. In the evenings they will sing the 
refrain of the popular song, " The Old Flag " : — 

" Here 'tis hidden 'neath the straw, 

Flag that flew from field to field, 

Sure to conquer, not to yield. 
Twenty years all Europe saw 
How it floated gloriously, 

Crowned with laurels and with flowers. 

When will come the happy hours 
When from dust I shake it free ? 

" For a moment cast off fears — 

Here, beside my arms it lies ; 

Come, my flag, my hope, my prize! 
'Tis for thee to dry my tears. 
When the warrior's tears they see. 

They will list, the heavenly Pow'rs : 

Yes, they'll come, the happy hours. 
When from dust I'll shake thee free I '* 

The 22d of June passed without Napoleon II. 
having been proclaimed. Instead of a regency, the 



NAPOLEON II. 195 



Chambers invested a committee of five of its mem- 
bers with sovereign powers. 

The Bonapartists, however, were to make one last 
effort in favor of Napoleon II. This four-year-old 
child, the prisoner of Austria, was proclaimed Em- 
peror of the French on Friday, June 23, 1815. But 
what a derisory proclamation ! It was not the Chamber 
of Peers, every member of which had been appointed 
by Napoleon and overwhelmed by his benefits, but 
the Chamber of Representatives that set up this 
empire of a day, this purely nominal empire. 

" Have we not a constitutional monarchy ? " ex- 
claimed Boulay de la Meurthe. " The Emperor dead, 
the Emperor lives. Napoleon I. has sent us his abdi- 
cation, and we have accepted it. By that fact alone, 
by the force of things, by an inevitable consequence, 
Napoleon II. is Emperor of the French. You cannot 
even deliberate about the matter. Our fundamental 
law decides the question. . . . The Emperor's abdi- 
cation is indivisible. . . . We are surrounded by 
intriguers and factious partisans who would like to 
have the throne declared vacant. ... I will go 
further still ; I will put my finger on the plague spot. 
There is an Orleans faction. It is useless to inter- 
rupt me. My information is explicit. I know that this 
faction is altogether Royalist. I know that its secret 
aim is to keep informed with regard to the patriots. 
However, it is not certain that the Duke of Orleans 
would accept the crown; but, if he did, it would 
doubtless be in order to relinquish it to Louis XVIII." 



196 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

The Assembly was wavering and undecided. Be- 
ing neither Republican, Royalist, nor Imperialist, it 
vaguely felt the falsity of its position. Manuel extri- 
cated it from this embarrassment by a speech which 
showed rare address. He proclaimed Napoleon II., but 
in a way which left a door of escape open to all parties. 
His harangue would not have been so cordially 
applauded had it been a real declaration of principles 
instead of a mere expedient. He began by saying 
that, " in proposing to proclaim Napoleon II. an inop- 
portune and imprudent question was raised; but, 
since it has been brought up, to evade it would be 
impossible. The constitutional right being incontes- 
table it must be affirmed." But how ? Will the name 
of Marie Louise be pronounced ? Will they establish a 
regency ? By no means. The order of the day which 
Manuel succeeded in getting passed, alleges : First, 
that "Napoleon II. became Emperor by the fact of 
the abdication of Napoleon I., and in virtue of the 
Constitutions of the Empire " ; second, that " the two 
Chambers, in naming a governmental committee, 
willed and intended to assure the nation of the needed 
guaranties for its liberty and repose in the present 
extraordinary circumstances." The nominal sover- 
eign was to be Napoleon II., but the real sovereign 
would be Fouchd, the President of the Executive Com- 
mission. But the Assembly appeared to take its vote 
as serious, and, as if wishing to put itself on good 
terms with its conscience, broke up with hypocritical 
cries of " Long live the Emperor ! " 



NAPOLEON II. 197 



The reign of Napoleon II. was to be only a phan- 
tom, a vanishing dream. His Empire was no more 
real than his Kingdom of Rome. His two sceptres 
were broken like rattles, one after another. But will 
not his mother, at least, speak for him ? It does not 
even occur to her to do so. The forgetful and un- 
faithful wife would not consent to leave her orilded 
prison, even though her jailers should open the doors. 
She does not wish her child to be anything but an 
Austrian prince. Nothing will remain of this title 
of Napoleon II. but the vote of an inconsistent As- 
sembly and the immortal ode of a poet. 

On that very evening of June 23, Fouch^ said to 
his intimates : " Everything is all right ; we have 
confronted the old regime with the Constitutions of 
the Empire. I hope to see both pleaders back to back 
before long." And the next day he had the nominal 
accession of Napoleon II. placed on the minutes, but 
in his proclamation of the Provisional Government, 
he announced that all public acts would be performed 
solely in the name of the French people. He who 
had been Emperor tAvo days before wanted to protest 
against this anomaly, but found no one willing to 
carry his protest to the Chamber. 

The news of the abdication reached Laon, where 
the survivors of the army were assembled, on June 
24, and caused inexpressible wrath and indignation. 
"Why should we fight any longer," said the sol- 
diers, "since there is no longer an Emperor?" 
These indefatigable heroes, who did not despair of 



198 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

avenging Waterloo, declared themselves betrayed, 
and yielded to a very delirium of sorrow. At Paris, 
the old soldiers, the federates, the patriots who 
crowded the Avenue Marigny, were animated by the 
same sentiments. Fouch^'s government began to be 
afraid. It could not be easy while Napoleon was 
there ; and in case he had not consented to go, they 
would probably have forced him. Marshal Davoust 
was sent to the Elys^e to urge his old master to 
depart. Napoleon did not resist; he left Paris the 
next day. 

At noon on Sunday, June 25, 1815, — the battle of 
Waterloo had been fought just a week before, — Na- 
poleon left the Elys^e Palace in a simple carriage 
and went to Malmaison. He drove through the 
avenue where, as if by a sarcasm of destiny, rose the 
colossal foundations of what was to be the Arc de 
Triomphe de I'Etoile. This avenue, once for him the 
route of ovations and of triumphs, must have occa- 
sioned him some bitter thoughts. It must have 
recalled the radiant morning of April 2, 1810, that 
day of incomparable splendor when he made his sol- 
emn entry into Paris with the young Empress Marie 
Louise. Where is that departed magnificence? The 
halt before the gorgeous decoration which simulated 
the present Arch of Triumph ; the carriage drawn by 
eight horses, its gilded roof supported by four eagles 
with outspread wings; the Marshals of France on 
horseback at the sides of the imperial carriage ; the 
applause of the crowd ; the ringing of bells ; the salvos 



NAPOLEON II. 199 



of artillery, the, beating of drums, the blare of the 
trumpets, — what is left of all that glorious pomp ? 
And the woman whom a delirious people saluted 
with joyous homage ; the woman to whom young girls 
dressed in white offered gifts and flowers ; the woman 
whose arrival seemed the pledge of perpetual pros- 
perity and peace ; the young Empress of the French, 
where is she at this hour when her husband begins 
the stations of his Calvary? She is in the midst 
of the enemies of France ; she watches, unmoved, 
the outbursts of their joy. It is even on this very 
day, June 25, 1815, that at Baden, near Schoen- 
brunn, where she is occupying the same house with 
her step-mother. Napoleon's bitter enemy, she learns 
the tidings of Waterloo. Under the windows of this 
house, common to both sovereigns, bands are playing 
serenades to celebrate the victory of the Coalition. 
What a Shakespearean contrast ! On the same day, 
Napoleon deposed, quitting his capital never to re- 
turn ; Napoleon proscribed, drinking to the dregs the 
cup of bitterness as General and as Emperor, as hus- 
band and as father; and the Austrian musicians 
playing triumphant music under the windows of 
Marie Louise ! Have the trumpets of Fortinbras at 
the denouement of Hamlet a stranger sound? 



XII. 



MALMAISON. 



THE most picturesque of historians, — he who has 
adopted as his programme that magical saying, 
" History is the resurrection of the dead," — Miche- 
let, has said in one of his lectures ; " Gentlemen, the 
greatest man of the world was a man. Now, he had 
a wife, and one day he wanted to change her for an- 
other. Great anguish, tears, lamentations. He said, 
' It is only a woman ! ' You were not living during 
the Empire, gentlemen, but I was. I was a child 
then. I tell you, it was a time when nobody talked. 
The Emperor had done everything, you know ; he 
had changed Europe and suppressed nations, and 
thrown the Republic out of the window. Nobody 
said a word; profound silence. One morning he 
wanted to send away his wife ; all the world talked. 
Discussions began in every family. I heard this dis- 
pute between a man and his wife. The man said: 
' She has given him no children. She has committed 
more than one fault. He might have divorced her 
when he came back from Egypt.' ' But he didn't,' 
said the woman. ' Why not now, then ? The Em- 
200 



MALMAISON. 20i 



peror is all alone. Ought he not to surround himself 
with powerful families ? His isolation is also that of 
France.' To which the woman, without arguing, sim- 
ply answered : ' No matter ; it won't bring him good 
luck.' ' And why not ? ' '•It won't bring him good 
luck!''' 

On that Sunday of June 25, 1815, when the van- 
quished of Waterloo found himself once more at 
Malmaison, that poetic residence, all filled with souve- 
nirs of Josephine, in the depths of his soul he com- 
pared his second wife to his first one, and recognized 
— too late, alas ! — how fatal to him the divorce had 
been. Evidently, feminine sentiment and popular 
instinct were not at fault : It had not brought him 
good luck. In re-entering Malmaison he forgot every- 
thing but Josephine : Josephine, whose sad and grace- 
ful phantom appeared to him in each apartment of 
the castle, and at the turn of every garden-path. 
Madame Caffarelli, an eyewitness, says that " he 
made no allusion to his situation, but talked about 
the domestic scenes in which he had participated 
here. At every door, at every window, he recalled 
either some remark of Josephine's, some jest of by- 
gone days, or some amusement of their domestic life." 
Concerning the present and the future he said not a 
word. But the entire past revived again. 

When the Emperor arrived at Malmaison, no one 
had dared to ask him any questions about his destina- 
tion. They had left him to his reveries. It was a 
brief moment of repose on this Calvary whose sta- 



202 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



tions might be called Malmaison, Rochefort, the Bel- 
leropJion, the NortJiumherland^ Saint Helena. Napo- 
leon reflected on worldly things as if they concerned 
him no longer. The inactivity of this man, once so 
pre-eminently active, had something terrifying in it. 
The next day, Monday, June 26, 1815, those about 
him broke the silence, and discussed before him the 
part he ought to take. The Duke of Bassano assured 
him that the people and the army were on his side, 
and that, if he chose, he could seize anew the reins 
of government, make himself obeyed by the troops, 
and dissolve the Chambers. When the Duke had 
gone out, Napoleon said with a melancholy smile, 
" Maret is always just the same, always ready to flat- 
ter me and himself, always ready to see and believe 
whatever he pleases." 

On that day the Countess de Las Cases went to Mal- 
maison to meet her husband. " ' My dear,' he said to 
her, 'in doing my duty I have the consolation of not 
compromising your interests. If Napoleon II. is to 
rule us, I am leaving you great claims upon him. If 
Heaven ordains otherwise, I shall have secured for 
you a glorious refuge and a name worthy of esteem. 
In any case, we shall meet again, even if it is only in 
a better world.' After tears and even reproaches, 
which could not but be sweet to me," goes on the 
author of the Memoirs, " she yielded and promised to 
rejoin me soon ; and from that moment I found noth- 
ing in her but elevated enthusiasm, and the courage 
which might have failed me if I had needed it." 



MALMAISON. 203 



The day passed, however, without the Emperor's 
having spoken of the future. He listened to all, and 
made remarks on what was said, but he manifested 
no resolve. 

Tuesday^ June 27. What is to become of the great 
Emperor, the proscribed man ? Where shall he go ? To 
America or to England? Will he be free ? Will he be 
a prisoner ? If he leaves Malmaison, this asylum of a 
few hours, who will protect him against such outrages 
as those which overwhelmed him a year ago, on his 
way to Elba? Is he not in danger of becoming a trophy 
of Bliicher, or of falling under the blows of Royalist 
assassins ? If he wishes to go to America, how is he 
to get to a port of embarkation ? And, once at sea, 
how can he escape the English cruisers ? Every one 
about Napoleon is asking such questions, but he him- 
self seems to dread approaching them. In the midst 
of his distress there still remains I know not what 
vague hope of regaining his position. He expects 
unconsciously some miraculous event. He delays 
his departure from Malmaison as, in 1812, he delayed 
it from the Kremlin. One might say that a secret 
force retained him in this residence of his happy days, 
this gracious temple of his youth and glory. But 
time presses. The Prussians are coming. Whether 
he will or no, he must depart. 

On the preceding day, June 26, the Provisional 
Government had issued a decree thus worded : — 

" Article 1. The Minister of the Navy shall give 
orders that two frigates of the port of Rochefort be 



204 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

armed for the transportation of Napoleon Bonaparte 
to the United States. 

''Art. 2. He shall be provided to the place of 
embarkation, if he desires it, with a sufficient escort, 
under command of General Beker, who is charged to 
provide for his safety. 

"Art. 3. The Postmaster-General, on his part, 
shall give orders relative to the necessary changes of 
horses. 

"Art. 4. The Minister of the Navy shall issue 
the necessary orders to assure the immediate return 
of the frigates after disembarkation. 

" Art. 5. The frigates shall not leave the road- 
stead of Rochefort until the requisite passports have 
arrived." 

It is from England, from Wellington, that the Pro- 
visional Government pretends to obtain these pass- 
ports ; Wellington will refuse to give them. From 
hour to hour the situation becomes more difficult. 

Presently General Beker, a member of the Cham- 
ber of Deputies, arrives at Malmaison. Pie comes to 
announce to the Emperor that he has been sent by 
the Minister of War to take command of the troops 
committed to him and to be responsible for the Em- 
peror's person to the Provisional Government. At 
Malmaison there is a battalion of infantry and a hun- 
dred dragoons of the Imperial Guard. 

While General Beker is taking command and being 
acknowledged by the officers. Napoleon, walking in 
the garden with the Duke of Rovigo, says to him ; 



MALMAISON. 205 



" This smacks of a revolutionary committee rather 
than a generous government. I do not understand 
why the Minister of War did not communicate with 
me. Perhaps he saw nothing wrong in that, but at 
all events, the choice of Beker reassures me. Sieyes 
was right in saying they would abandon me. Still, 
I cannot go without vessels and passports ; otherwise, 
the first village mayor could arrest me. All that 
would be necessary would be to tell him that I am 
carrying off treasure ; he would write to Paris, the 
Provisional Government would not answer, matters 
would be precipitated, and that is how one would 
come to ruin." 

General Beker was neither a jailer nor a traitor. 
He was an honorable man, a brave soldier, and the 
brother-in-law of General Desaix. Accordincr to 
Count de Las Cases, '' Fouche knew that Beker had 
personal reasons to complain of the Emperor, and he 
expected to find him bitter and disposed to ven- 
geance ; he could not have deceived himself more 
grossly. This General constantly displayed a respect 
and devotion most honorable to his character." Of 
tried loyalty, he was incapable of remembering that 
he had been disgraced in 1809. When he saw the 
emotion depicted on the General's strong countenance, 
Napoleon recognized at once that he had to do with 
a man of feeling. He gave him a friendly recep- 
tion. To the very end he found in him a respectful 
servant and a friend in misfortune. But he distrusted 
the Provisional Government as thoroughly as he con- 



206 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

fided in General Beker. " Would they be capable," 
]ie asked, "of leaving me no alternative except that 
of giving myself up to my enemies ? " 

The same day the Minister of the Navy, Duke 
Decrds, arrived at Malmaison and communicated to 
Napoleon the following despatch from Fouchd : — 

" Paris, June 27, morning. To the Minister of the 
Navy. M. le Due, it is urgent that the Emperor 
should depart. The enemy is advancing, and may 
be already at Compiegne. The Committee desire 
that you should repair at once to Malmaison to in- 
duce the Emperor to leave, because we cannot be 
responsible for what may happen. As to that pro- 
vision of Article 5, of yesterday's decree, which re- 
lates to the passports, the Committee authorize you 
to consider it null and void. All the other pro- 
visions remain in force. 

" [Signed] The Duke of Oteanto. 

"P.S. It is important that the Emperor should 
go in disguise." 

The Minister of the Navy had hardly left Mal- 
maison when the Emperor was informed of new con- 
tradictory instructions from Fouch^, in which he 
said: "According to the despatches just received, 
the Emperor cannot leave our ports without safe- 
conducts. He must await them on the road. Con- 
sequently, the decree of yesterday remains in full 
force, and the letter written this morning to annul 
Article 5, is superseded. Guide yourself by the text 
of yesterday's decree." 



MALMAISON. 207 



It is impossible to mistake the intent of all these 
incertitudes and contradictory measures. As Walter 
Scott has said: "The members of the Provisional 
Government, like skilful fishermen, had gradually 
cast their nets about Napoleon, and they thought it 
was time to draw him to land." Let us render Duke 
Decr^s the justice to admit that he made every effort 
to save the Emperor from captivity. The day be- 
fore, June 26, he had written to him : " You will 
notice, Sire, on the list of American vessels, one 
which is now at Havre. The captain is in my ante- 
chamber. His post-chaise is at the door. I answer 
for him. To-morrow you will be out of reach of 
your enemies." Napoleon had refused this offer. 
To save himself clandestinely on a merchant vessel 
seemed to him unworthy of his glory ; and when he 
saw around him a handful of young military heroes 
still dreaming of battles and adventures, and believ- 
ing even at this moment in the possibility of aveng- 
ing Waterloo, he did not wholly despair of drawing 
the sword once more. 

Wednesday^ June 28. The situation, however, was 
becoming more and more disquieting. It was to be 
feared, from hour to hour, that Malmaison might be 
seized by the enemy. Their cannon could be heard 
already on the plain of Saint-Denis : it was the sec- 
ond time in fifteen months that tliis disastrous sound 
had stupefied and afflicted patriotic souls. The 
bridges of Neuilly, Saint-Cloud, and Sevres had been 
barricaded, and those of Saint-Denis, Bezons, Chatou, 



208 ELBA, AND THE HUNDIiED DAYS. 

and Pecq destroyed. But these precautions could 
not protect Malmaison from a surprise. The Prus- 
sian fires could be seen on the other side of the Seine. 
The little garrison, comprising a battalion of in- 
fantry and a hundred dragoons of the Guard, under 
Generals de Flahault, Gourgaud, de Lab^doyere, 
Bertrand, and Savary, made preparations for a vig- 
orous resistance. Near the Emperor, however, all 
remained calm, and no one knew what decision he 
had reached when he summoned all his friends. " I 
have done all that you wished," said he. " Here are 
my letters to the Provisional Government and my 
correspondence with the Minister of the Navy. The 
difficulties they have put in the way of giving me 
two armed frigates have delayed me until now. It 
is their fault that I did not go sooner, but I am about 
to go." 

Yet, even while making these preparations for de- 
parture. Napoleon still preserved a lingering hope. 
As Walter Scott has expressed it, he listened to the 
cannonading in the distance as a war-horse listens to 
the sound of the trumpet. Some officers from the 
army arrived at Malmaison, their uniforms covered 
with blood and dust, and besought their General, 
their Emperor, to place himself once more at their 
head. They informed him that the enemy had com- 
mitted the imprudence of advancing in two bodies of 
sixty thousand each, which left them so far apart 
that Bliicher might be overpowered before Welling- 
ton could reach him. Grouchy, having dexterously 



MALMAISON. 209 



escaped from pursuit, was coming with fresh troops 
in excellent order : his advance columns were already 
approaching Paris by all the eastern routes, and 
there would be sixty thousand men to engage the 
sixty thousand Prussians, and to turn afterwards 
against the English. Napoleon thanked the officers 
for their news, and during the night of June 28-29, 
he ruminated the project of resuming command of 
the troops. 

Concerning this project Walter Scott has said: 
" At a moment when the capital was about to be sur- 
rounded anew by foreign armies, an honorable senti- 
ment, united to political considerations, might have 
made Napoleon hope that the representatives, in 
order to make use of his extraordinary talents, and 
his influence over the troops and the federates, who 
alone could defend Paris, would be disposed to lay 
aside personal animosities and permit him to resume 
his sword for the protection of the capital. But dis- 
cord had made too much progress in the interior." 
In the night of June 28-29, at the very moment 
when Napoleon was beginning to cherish a last hope, 
Duke Decr^s and M. Boulay de la Meurthe came to 
Malmaison to notify him of the definitive instructions 
of the Provisional Government. They were in this 
wise : — 

" Long delays having elapsed since passports were 
demanded for Napoleon, and the existing circum- 
stances arousing fears for his personal safety, we 
have decided to regard Article 5 of our decree of 



210 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 

June 26, as null and void. Consequently, the frigates 
are placed at Napoleon's disposal. No obstacle to his 
departure now remains. The interests of the State, 
as well as his own, demand imperiously that he shall 
start at once after you have notified him of our deter- 
mination." 

The Emperor replied that he was ready to go, but 
would first despatch a message to the Provisional 
Government. 

Thursday^ June 29. At daybreak. Napoleon or- 
dered his saddle-horses to be got ready, put on his 
uniform, and summoned General Beker. He said to 
him, in very nearly these words, "The enemy has 
just made a great blunder, — one that might easily 
have been anticipated, for that matter, from the char- 
acter of the two allied generals. They have advanced 
in two masses of sixty thousand men each, which has 
left so considerable a distance between them that one 
could be overpowered before the other would have 
time to come up. We have here a unique occasion, 
arranged for us by Providence, which it would be 
both guilty and foolish in us to neglect. You know, 
General, that at present all is lost ; there is no hope. 
Very well ! let them give me back the command of 
the army, and I promise to conquer at its head. Go 
and present my request to the Executive Committee. 
Explain to them thoroughly that I do not dream of 
resuming power; I want only to fight the enemy, 
crush them before Paris, shelter you all by a victory, 
and constrain the chiefs of the Coalition to desire 



MALMAISON. 211 



peace. That done, I will continue my route toward 
exile. ... I give them my word of honor, my word 
as general, soldier, and citizen, not to keep command 
an hour after the certain and brilliant victory which 
I promise to gain, not for myself, but for France. . . . 
Go, General ; I confide myself to you. Aid me in 
this, and you shall never leave me again." 

General Beker started immediately to Paris with 
this message, of which these are the concluding' 
words : " The hurried march of the enemies upon 
the capital leaves no room to doubt their bad faith. 
In these grave circumstances, gentlemen, I ask to 
serve France for the last time, and I swear to save 
it." 

On arriving at the Tuileries, General Beker deliv- 
ered Napoleon's message to the five members of the 
Provisional Government. "What do you think of 
that ? " said Fouch^ to his colleagues. " I think he 
is laughing at us. Come ! this is going too far ! " 
Then, turning toward the General : " Why did you 
bring such a message as that ? Don't you know the 
situation ? For Napoleon to appear again in command 
of the army would be equivalent to another disaster, 
and the ruin of Paris. Let him leave at once, for 
they are demanding his person, and we cannot answer 
for his safety more than a few hours." The General 
was instructed to carry back to Malmaison this 
laconic response of the five members of the Provis- 
ional Government : " The duties of the Committee 
toward the country do not permit it to accept the 



212 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

proposition and tlie active assistance of the Emperor 
Napoleon." 

General Beker returned in all haste to Malmaison. 
He found the Emperor in uniform, either believing 
or feigning to believe that he might have received a 
favorable reply from Fouche. After reading the 
missive of the Provisional Government, Napoleon con- 
tented himself with saying : " These men are inca- 
pable of energy. Since that is the case, let us go into 
exile." He had his horses unsaddled, and replaced 
his uniform by a citizen's dress. A young merchant 
came hurriedly to warn him that in the plain of Saint- 
Denis he had seen three corps of Prussian cavalry 
which were following the course of the Seine and 
seemed to be approaching Malmaison. The Emperor 
thanked him for the information, and ordered the car- 
riages to be brought up. His suite was divided into 
two parts. The first was composed of several car- 
riages intended to contain M. and Madame de Mon- 
tholon and their child, M. de Las Cases, his son, 
and several orderlies. They were to gain the Or- 
leans road, pass through Chateauroux, and reach 
Rochefort on a certain day. The other division com- 
prised only a single light calash, which Napoleon, 
General Bertrand, and the Duke of Rovigo were to 
occupy. The Emperor's valet was on the coachman's 
seat. A courier went ahead to order the carriages at 
the different post-stations. 

The carriages destined for the first division drew 
up in the principal courtyard, in front of the vestibule 



MALMAISON. 213 



of the chateau, while the Emperor's calash waited for 
him in the small court separating the house from the 
kitchens. Napoleon went to it through the winding 
alleys of the garden. He said farewell to his mother, 
his brothers, and his faithful servants. Queen Hor- 
tense begged him to accept a diamond necklace, so 
that he might have resources at hand which it would 
be easy to conceal. He refused at first. Hortense 
insisted : she wept. He yielded, took the necklace, 
put it in his coat pocket, and gave a last glance at 
the trees which had sheltered beneath their foliage so 
many joys and so much glory. Then he quickly en- 
tered the carriage, and seeing him depart, all the 
spectators melted into tears. 



XIII. 



EOCHEFOET. 



THE heat was stifling when the carriage contain- 
ing the Emperor and Generals Bertrand, Beker, 
and Savary quitted Malmaison. Napoleon did not 
speak a word, and his companions, as melancholy as 
himself, respected his silence. The carriage, which 
resembled a funeral coach, went through the woods 
of Butart to Rocquencourt, and without passing 
through Versailles, which was on the left, it went by 
Saint-Cyr to take the Chartres road. They reached 
Rambouillet at nightfall. The Emperor slept at the 
chateau. It was the last imperial residence in which 
he lodged. The same thing had happened to Marie 
Louise. She had stayed there with her son from 
April 13 to April 23 the previous year. It was there 
she became the prisoner of Austria; there she had an 
interview with her father ; from there she started for 
Vienna. Rambouillet, therefore, afforded Napoleon 
a subject for some bitter reflections. As sovereign, 
as husband, and as father, he must have yielded to 
sorrowful meditations. 

Friday^ June 30, 1815. At a very early hour the 
214 



ROCHEFOET. 216 



carriage containing the Emperor and the three gen- 
erals left the chateau of Rambouillet by the path con- 
ducting to the park gate, which opens on the Chartres 
road beyond the town. 

At the Chateaudun station the post-mistress came 
with a frightened face to the carriage door to inquire 
if the travellers came from Paris, and if it were true 
that Napoleon had met with misfortune. Hardly 
had she asked the question when she recognized the 
Emperor. Without another word she lifted her eyes 
to heaven and went back weeping into her house. 

The travellers went on by VendQme to Tours, 
which they passed through by night. The carriage 
stopped on the Poitiers road, just after leaving the 
city. The Emperor wished to see the prefect, and 
Savary going to fetch him, he talked for a quarter 
of an hour with this official. Then he resumed his 
journey, preserving the strictest incognito. 

Saturday^ July 1. They passed through Poitiers 
in the daytime. The heat was excessive. They 
stopped for a short time at the post-house, which was 
outside the town, and took some brief repose without 
being recognized. 

At Saint-Maixent they found a crowd assembled 
in the square in front of the town hall. The National 
Guard were on the alert since the troubles had begun 
again in La Vendue. They stopped the carriage and 
demanded passports. General Beker showed his, and 
also the orders of the Provisional Government. No 
mention was made of the Emperor, and he was not 



216 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

recognized. The General's firmness succeeded in 
overcoming all difficulties, and they were allowed to 
go on. At nightfall they reached Niort, where they 
remained nearly two days. Napoleon still enter- 
tained a vague hope that some unforeseen event 
might recall him, if not to the throne, at least to the 
command of the troops, and not having abandoned 
the thought of going back, he travelled with inten- 
tional slowness. 

Sunday, July 2. The sentiments testified by the 
people of Niort fed the last illusions of the Emperor. 
There were troops in the town intended to repress 
the rising in La Vendee. They gave Napoleon a 
very warm reception. As soon as his arrival became 
known, soldiers, citizens, and people of the lower 
classes crowded under his windows, demanding to see 
him. He appeared, and was greeted with cheers. 
The prefect begged him to stay at the prefecture, and 
he accepted the invitation. The day passed in pro- 
found emotion, shared alike by him and the popula- 
tion. 

Monday^ July 3. General Beker, always respectful 
toward the Emperor, told him in the morning that it 
might be dangerous to delay in this manner, as there 
was reason to fear the arrival of an English fleet 
before Rochefort, which would render his departure 
for the United States impossible. Napoleon allowed 
himself to be convinced, and left Niort, but not with- 
out regret. A detachment of light cavalry escorted 
him. Before evening they entered Rochefort. In 



ROCHEFORT. 217 



the town and its environs were a regiment of naval 
artillery, fifteen hundred National Guards, and nearly 
three thousand gens d'armes, all of them well disposed 
toward the Emperor. They protested their devotion 
to him. They begged to follow him. He stayed at 
the Maritime Prefecture, and the people gave him 
just such a welcome as he had received at Niort. 
There was not a soldier within ten leagues who was 
not anxious to see him. " The people," says the 
Duke of Rovigo, an eyewitness, "never went from 
under the Emperor's windows ; he was obliged to 
show himself at times to satisfy their impatience. 
Every time he did so he was received with the same 
respect as if he had triumphed over all his enemies. 
Rochefort is one of the towns on whose sanitation 
Napoleon had expended most money. For many 
years he had continued the works for drying up the 
marshes that surround it, and had also done much 
toward embellishing the town itself. All these under- 
takings had been crowned with success ; the inhabi- 
tants of Rochefort were grateful on that account, and 
not afraid to show it." 

Tuesday^ July 4. Napoleon was soon to be forced 
to a decision. Up to June 29 there had been few Eng- 
lish cruisers in sight, and those far away. But since 
that day they were approaching the two channels, 
the Brittany channel and that of Antioche, by which 
Rochefort communicates with the sea. In the road- 
stead lay two French men-of-war, the Saale and the 
MSduse^ which the Provisional Government had put 



218 



ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



at the disposal of the Emperor to land him wherever 
he chose except on any part of the French coast, but 
they were now blockaded by English cruisers. 

The situation constantly becoming more critical, 
Napoleon called a naval council in the morning of 
July 4, to consider it on all sides. Admiral Martin and 
Baron Bonnefoux, the maritime prefect, were present. 

It was said at this council that, notwithstanding 
the approach of the English vessels, the two French 
frigates had the reputation of being such good sailers 
that, once outside the channels, they could elude all 
pursuit. Still, favorable winds would be required, 
and at present, unfortunately, they were contrary. 
Napoleon, who greatly dreaded leaving France, did 
not complain much at this delay. More occupied, 
probably, with what was passing at Paris than with 
events at Rochef ort, he followed the confused accounts 
in the journals, in the hope of drawing from them 
some conclusion favorable to himself, or, at least, 
favorable to his son. 

The maritime prefect wrote the following letter on 
July 4, to the Minister of the Navy : " Monseigneur, I 
have the honor to inform Your Excellency that Napo- 
leon arrived at Rochefort yesterday, at nine in the 
morning, with his suite. The frigates were ready, 
but the English fleet stationed here, consisting of 
two ships, two frigates, two corvettes, and a small 
vessel, blockade the port, and every kind of transport 
from the Gironde to La Rochelle, so completely that 
there is neither hope of getting past them unper- 



ROCHEFORT. 219 



ceived nor of forcing a way between them. The 
august personage whom the French nation has taken 
under its protection has made all his arrangements 
for departure. The intentions of the commission and 
the orders of Your Excellency will be executed in 
every point which concerns me. His Majesty is and 
will be treated with attention and respect due to his 
situation and to the crown which he has worn." 

On the same day, the carriages which had left 
Malmaison when the Emperor did, and which carried 
Madame Bertrand, M. and Madame de Montholon, 
M. de Las Cases, and their children, as well as several 
orderly officers, arrived at Rochefort. In the evening 
King Joseph made his appearance. 

Wednesday^ July 5, to Friday^ July 7. Listen to 
Count de Las Cases, an eyewitness : " At Rochefort 
the Emperor no longer wore a uniform. He lodged 
at the prefecture, and a great many people were con- 
stantly grouped about the house. From time to time 
cheers broke out ; twice or thrice the Emperor made 
his appearance in the balcony. Many propositions 
were made to him by generals who came in per- 
son or sent special emissaries. For the rest, during 
his entire stay at Rochefort, the Emperor was pre- 
cisely as he had been in the Tuileries ; we did not 
approach him more freely; he received hardly any 
one except Bertrand and Savary, and we were re- 
duced to rumors and conjectures concerning him. 
Always, it seems as if the Emperor, in the midst of 
whatever agitation of men and things, remains calm 



220 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 

and impassible, shows himself very indifferent, and, 
above all, very little harassed." 

In reality. Napoleon did not wish to depart until 
he knew the result of the political crisis which, at 
Paris, was reaching its height. He had still a linger- 
ing hope, so long as the army clung to the tricolor 
and Louis XVIII. had not re-entered the Tuileries. 
The Provisional Government and the two Chambers 
were in their agony. On July 3, a capitulation had 
been signed, in virtue of which the French army 
evacuated Paris, and retired across the Loire. The 
soldiers had in vain broken their weapons and ex- 
claimed against this treason. On July 5, the enemy 
entered the capital as if it were a conquered city. 

King Joseph, on his way to Rochefort, had seen 
the French columns marching towards the Loire. 
He had heard generals, officers, and soldiers ardently 
longing for the presence of the Emperor. This news 
agitated Napoleon greatly. On learning that the 
Army of the Loire would be raised to eighty thou- 
sand men, he recalled the miracles he had so often 
wrought with many less, both in the first Italian 
campaign and in that of 1814. Saying to himself 
that his abdication might be considered null, since 
no account had been made of his son's rights, he ex- 
perienced a violent temptation to place himself once 
more at the head of the troops. But reflection 
showed him that France was weary of fighting ; that 
all Europe would rise in arms against him, if he 
attempted to reappear upon the scene, and that he, 



TtOCHEFORT. 221 



the great Emperor, could not without loss descend to 
the part of a mere party chief. But what was he 
to do ? Where would he find a refuge ? How 
should he escape the English cruisers ? How reach 
the United States? 

Propositions, each more dangerous than the others, 
were constantly being made to the unfortunate Em- 
peror. A French seaman, M. Besson, commanding 
a Danish merchant vessel, guaranteed to conceal him 
perfectly, and offered to start at once for the United 
States. He demanded nothing but a small sum, 
sufficient to idemnify the owners. A contract was 
signed, but Napoleon refused to hide himself in 
the hold of a neutral vessel. Such a lurking-place 
seemed to him unworthy of his glory. 

Another proposition, suggested by Admiral Mar- 
tin, was for him to go up the Seudre in a small boat, 
cross on horseback the tongue of land separating the 
Charente from the Gironde, and embark at Royan on 
a French corvette, commanded by Captain Baudin, 
a daring and distinguished seaman, who died an 
admiral of France. But it was feared that the cor- 
vette could not escape the British fleet. 

Finally a small coasting-vessel was suggested. It 
was all ready to sail, and was to be manned by mid- 
shipmen who hoped to outwit the vigilance of the 
cruisers. But once at sea, this coaster would be sus- 
pected, and it was more than doubtful whether it 
was substantial enough to make a voyage like that 
from Rochefort to the United States. 



222 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBED BATS, 

Moreover, time was pressing. Louis XVIII. was 
about to reascend the throne, and his instructions 
against Napoleon would certainly be more rigorous 
than those of the Provisional Government. It was 
plain that Napoleon would not be permitted to profit 
by the French frigates, and would be in danger of 
becoming the King's prisoner. 

Saturday/, July 8. In the morning, General Beker 
observed respectfully to the Emperor that the time 
for delay was over. Napoleon decided, therefore, to 
leave Rochefort for the roadstead of the Island of 
Aix, where he could go on board the Saale^ one of 
the two French frigates, and there await a favorable 
wind. That evening he started in a carriage for 
Fouras, which is at the mouth of the Charente, in 
the roadstead of Aix. The people, hearing of his 
departure, hastened to attend, him on his journey. 
There was a considerable crowd when he alighted 
from the carriage at Fouras. All wore sad faces, 
and the whisper went round, "Is it possible that 
such a great man should be abandoned like this?" 

The Emperor bade adieu to each one of the detach- 
ment of cavalry who had accompanied him, and got 
into the SaaWs yawl, which had been waiting for 
him before the chateau of Fouras. The officers of 
his suite followed in the- boats of the Meduse. It 
was late when he went aboard the Saale^ the wind 
being contrary and very strong. He spent the night 
of July 8-9 on the ship. 

Sunday^ July 9. In the morning, as the winds 



ROCHEFORT. 223 



still remained contrary, the Emperor and his suite 
went to the Island of Aix. He visited the fortifica- 
tions and reviewed the regiment of marines, who 
shouted, " Long live the Emperor ! To the Army of 
Loire ! " He went back to the Saale for breakfast. 
During the day the winds became more favorable, 
but the English fleet seemed to be watching the 
French frigates. In the evening Napoleon, feeling 
inclined to return to Rochefort, embarked in a small 
boat, so as to be less noticed; but as the shore seemed 
guarded, he went back to the Island of Aix. He 
was blockaded on this island, without means of 
egress either toward the continent or the sea. Pro- 
posals for a clandestine flight were again renewed ; 
but he continued to reject the idea of embarking on 
a coasting-vessel. Among other reasons he assigned 
that of the necessity of revictualling on the coast of 
Spain or Portugal, which would expose him to fall 
into the hands of a powerful enemy. The Danish 
corvette was also suggested. As it was certain that 
she would be searched by the English as soon as she 
quitted the port, the Emperor was assured that a 
hiding-place could be contrived for him. It was a 
cask to be stowed among the ballast, and provided 
with tubes for introducing air. But the extreme 
rigor with which the search would doubtless be 
made, and the corpulence of Napoleon, which would 
not permit of his remaining any length of time 
closely confined in such an uncomfortable position, 
caused this expedient to be rejected: besides, the 
Emperor refused it as undignified. 



224 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

The danger continued to increase. The white flag 
was about to be raised at Rochefort. Already the 
commandant of the place had caused Napoleon to be 
notified, as respectfully as possible, that he must 
think seriously of departing. The Provisional Gov- 
ernment was no longer in existence. The hall of 
the Chamber of Deputies had been clcsed by the 
Prussians. On July 8, Louis XVIII., efc.'Corted by 
the Marshal Dukes of Tarento, Ragusa, Fei^re, Reg- 
gio, and Belluno, had triumphantly re-entered the 
Tuileries. Napoleon could foresee that he would 
not be protected by the batteries of the Island of Aix 
much longer. He could no longer expect any con- 
sideration on the part of France. And then it was 
that the idea came to him of confiding himself to the 
generosity of England. 

Monday^ July 10. In the night of July 9-10, Na- 
poleon sent the Duke of Rovigo and Count de Las 
Cases to the commander of the English fleet. Captain 
Maitland, who was on board the man-of-war Beller- 
ophon. The two messengers of the Emperor left 
the Saale in a small schooner, availing themselves 
of the outgoing tide, which carried them beyond 
Point Chassiron, at the extremity of the Island of 
Oleron, where the English vessel was cruising about 
in company with the corvette Myrmidon. 

The two envoys went on board the BelleropTion 
about eight in the morning. M. de Las Cases ap- 
prised Captain Maitland of some news of which he 
was still in ignorance, namely : that in consequence 



ROCHEFORT, 225 



of the events which had followed the battle of 
Waterloo, the Emperor had abdicated and come to 
Rochefort with the intention of sailing for America ; 
that the Provisional Government had demanded 
passports for him from Wellington, who had referred 
the request to London ; and that it was thought they 
might have been forwarded to the English fleet, sta- 
tioned near Rochefort. Captain Maitland replied 
that he had received nothing. M. de Las Cases 
returned that the Emperor, having completely ter- 
minated his political career, desired to go away peace- 
ably; and that if he was anxious for passports, it 
was because he desired to prevent an engagement 
between the two French frigates and such Britannic 
vessels as they might meet. 

" I was entirely ignorant of the details you have 
given me," replied Captain Maitland. '' I had heard 
of nothing but the victory at Waterloo. Conse- 
quently, I cannot answer the request which is the 
subject of your message. But if you will wait a few 
moments, I shall probably know more about it, for 
I see a corvette trying to come up to us. She sig- 
nals that she comes from England and has letters 
for me. I shall handle the vessel so as to make her 
approach easier, and meantime we will go to break- 
fast." The corvette was the Falmouth, which did, 
in fact, come from England, and had passed through 
the Bay of Quiberon, whence it brought despatches 
from Admiral Hotham. 

Savary and Las Cases were eating breakfast with 



226 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Captain Maitland when the captain of the Falmouth 
reached the BelleropJion. After learning the con- 
tents of Admiral Hotham's despatches, Maitland 
said : " There is not a word concerning what you 
have just told me ; I know, even, that when the 
Falmouth sailed they knew nothing about it in Eng- 
land." 

The conversation was very courteous on both sides. 
Captain Maitland spoke French well. He was an 
honorable seaman, and a man of good breeding, who 
seemed to respect Napoleon's misfortunes. 

He ended by saying to his two interlocutors : "I 
should like to be able to satisfy you, but you see I 
cannot. I am going to notify my Admiral, who is in 
the Bay of Quiberon, of your coming on board. At 
the same time I will send him the letter you brought 
me from General Bertrand, and let you know his 
answer as soon as I receive it." 

Las Cases replied : " The Emperor does not want 
to steal away clandestinely. Personalty, he has no 
motive for doing so, as the application we have just 
made on his behalf sufficiently proves. But if, before 
your response arrives, the wind should become favor- 
able, and, desiring to profit by it, he goes out on the 
French frigates, what will you do ? What will you 
do if, instead of the French frigates, he goes in a 
French merchant vessel ? In fine, if instead of doing 
either, he should sail in a neutral vessel, an American 
ship for instance, what will you do ? " 

Captain Maitland responded: "If the Emperor 



ROCHEFORT. 227 



goes on the French frigates, I will attack them and 
take them if I can : in that case the Emperor will bo 
a prisoner. If he goes in a French merchant vessel, 
as we are at war, I will take the vessel, and again the 
Emperor will be a prisoner. If he goes in a neutral 
vessel, and I search it, I could not take it on me to 
let him pass. I should hold on to him and refer the 
matter to my Admiral, who would decide it." 

These responses once made, the conversation be- 
tween Napoleon's two envoys and the English sailor 
went on with great politeness. " The Emperor," said 
the latter, " did rightly in asking for passports, in 
order to escape the disagreeable encounters which 
would be constantly renewed at sea; but I do not 
believe our government would let him go to Amer- 
ica." "Where do they propose that he should go, 
then?" asked Savary. "I cannot guess," replied 
Maitland; "but I am almost certain of what I just 
told you. What repugnance would he have against 
coming to England ? All difficulties could be obvi- 
ated in that way." 

To the objections made by the two envoys in view 
of the English climate and the national ill-will toward 
Napoleon, Captain Maitland replied nearly in these 
terms: "It is a mistake to think the English climate 
is bad and damp. There are counties where it is as 
mild as that of France ; Kent, for instance. As to the 
charms of social life, they are incomparably superior 
in England to anything the Emperor could find in 
America. And as to the ill-feeling which he might 



228 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBED BAYS. 



fear, to come to England would be the very way to 
extinguish it. Living in the midst of the nation and 
under the protection of the laws, he would be defended 
from everybody and would render the efforts of his 
enemies powerless. Even if the Ministry wished to 
annoy him, which I do not believe, they could not, 
because our government is not arbitrary ; it is sub- 
jected to the laws. I am persuaded that the govern- 
ment would take the proper measures to assure the 
Emperor's tranquillity and that of the place where he 
should reside ; such, for example, as were taken with 
regard to his brother Lucien. But I cannot conceive 
it possible that it could go beyond that ; for, as I have 
told you, the Ministers would have no right, and the 
nation would not allow it." 

Las Cases replied : " I am not empowered to treat 
that question with you. But I shall remember all 
you have said, and will report it to the Emperor. In 

case he should adopt the idea of going to England, 

and I will do all in my power to persuade him, — may 
he count on being taken on board your vessel with 
all those who accompany him, this supposition debar- 
ring him from taking passage on the French frigates? " 

Captain Maitland answered: "I will ask instruc- 
tions from my Admiral. But if, before they reach 
me, the Emperor comes and asks a passage on board 
my ship, I will receive him. Moreover, I am going 
into the roadstead of the Basques, where I shall be 
nearer you, and where you can communicate with me 
whenever you please." 



ROCHE FORT. 229 



Las Cases and Savaiy, satisfied with Captain Mait- 
land's courteous treatment, but not building many- 
hopes on British generosity, took their leave, and, 
going on board the schooner which brought them, 
returned to the Emperor. He had remained on board 
the iSaale in the roadstead of the Island of Aix. He 
meditated all the evening on the report they brought 
him. 

Tuesday^ July 11. In the night of July 10-11, 
Napoleon ordered Savary to go and tell Captain 
Philibert, commander of the Saale, to sail at once. 
The latter replied that he had secret orders ; he was 
forbidden to accomplish his mission, " if the frigates 
ran into any danger." '* So then," exclaimed Savary, 
" all tliis was a mere deception ; the only aim of the 
Provisional Government was to place the Emperor 
under the necessity of delivering himself to the 
enemy!" "I do not know," replied Captain Phili- 
bert, "but I have orders not to sail." Savary, in 
consternation, brought this answer to Napoleon. 
" My presentiments warned me of it," said the Em- 
peror, sadly, " and yet I was unwilling to believe it." 

Then Captain Ponee, who commanded the other 
French frigate, the Meduse, made a heroic proposi- 
tion. He offered to weigh anchor at sunset, when 
there was usually a favorable breeze, and attack the 
Bellerophon, remaining attached to her side, until, 
even at the sacrifice of the MSduse^ he should have 
made it impossible for her to move. Meantime, the 
Saale, with the Emperor on board, could gain the 



230 ELBA, ANB THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

open sea. Napoleon, profoundly moved by such 
devotion, declined this offer, which the dispositions 
of Captain Philibert made impracticable in any case. 
He had no longer anything to hope for from the 
two French frigates, the Meduse and the Saale. 

Wednesday^ July 12. Napoleon received a visit 
from his brother Joseph, and letters announcing the 
events at Paris. There was more to be feared from 
the victorious emigres than from the English them- 
selves. Departure had become indispensable. Of 
all solutions, that of falling alive into the hands of 
the Royalists would be the worst. They would not 
pardon the Emperor the fright they had experienced 
during the Hundred Days. The moment that he 
could hope nothing farther from the two French 
frigates. Napoleon left the Saale^ and had himself 
put ashore on the Island of Aix, where a regiment 
of naval infantry were constantly in garrison. He 
was received there with enthusiasm. Still, it was 
necessary to decide on something. To go up the 
Seudre in a boat, and cross the tongue of land sepa- 
rating the Charente from the Gironde on horseback, 
in order to embark on an American vessel at the 
mouth of the latter stream, was no longer practica- 
ble ; for, since the last news from Paris, the white 
flag was floating everywhere, and the Royalist popu- 
lation would prevent his embarkation. Besides, the 
winds were still unfavorable. 

Thursday^ July 13. Despairing of his cause, Na- 
poleon, who at bottom had no confidence in British 



ROCHEFORT. 231 



generosity, was tempted to accept the offer of two 
coasting-vessels. The intrepid midshipmen said to 
him : " Sire, we are resolute men ; confide yourself 
to us. By oars or by sail we will take the boats 
beyond the channels; after that we will trust our- 
selves to the winds. They may bring us into the 
way of some merchant vessel which we will seize, 
and which we will oblige to transport Your Majesty 
to the United States. Under cover of the night, 
and with our oars, we can slip out unperceived." 
Napoleon was going to allow himself to be persuaded. 
In the evening of July 13, the two coasters were 
brought to the anchorage of Aix. Already several 
of the Emperor's attendants had entered it, when 
suddenly those who were about to start, and still 
more those who were to be left behind, broke into an 
indescribable explosion of grief. The women sobbed. 
Napoleon could not endure this spectacle. " Well I " 
he cried, " let us be done with it and give ourselves 
up to the English, since after all we cannot in any 
way escape them." And he thanked the brave young 
men, whose devotion and enthusiasm had profoundly 
touched him. 

Friday^ July 14. So this man, of whom one could 
have said that the whole world was not enough for 
him (u^stuat infelix angusto in earcere mundi)^ this 
conqueror who had not treated with Europe to pre- 
serve the Hanseatic Towns, the modern Caesar, the 
new Charlemagne, the Emperor of the French, the 
King of Italy, the mediator of the Swiss Confedera 



232 ELBA, AND TEE HUNDRED DAYS. 

tion, the protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, 
now banned, proscribed, tracked like a wild beast, 
chased from the earth and from the sea, had no 
longer a stone on which to lay his head I 

In the morning of July 14, the Emperor once more 
sent Count de Las Cases on board the BelleropJion^ 
accompanied this time by General Lallemand. The 
two envoys asked Captain Maitland if he had re- 
ceived yet any response from his superior. Admiral 
Hotham, chief of the naval station. He replied in 
the negative, but declared that he was, nevertheless, 
ready to receive the Emperor on the Bellerophon^ 
and take him to England. " It is my private opin- 
ion," added he, " that Napoleon will find there all 
the respect and good treatment which he can desire. 
It is a country where the Prince and the Ministers do 
not exercise arbitrary authority. The English peo- 
ple have a generosity of sentiment and a liberality of 
opinion Avhich are superior to sovereignty itself." 
Captain Maitland, however, spoke for himself only, 
and made no engagement on behalf of the British 
government, whose official intentions 'he did not 
know. At this time the BelleropJion was rejoined by 
the English corvette, the Slany^ commanded by Cap- 
tain Sertorius. 

Las Cases and General Lallemand returned the 
same day to the Island of Aix, and repeated to the 
Emperor what Captain Maitland had said. Evi- 
dently there was only one of two things for him to 
do : to deliver himself up to the English, or to at- 



ROCHEFORT. 233 



tempt to rejoin the Army of the Loire in order to 
begin a civil war, without the least chance of success. 
Napoleon caused all those who had accompanied him 
to be summoned, and asked their opinion. They 
were almost unanimous in saying that he ought to 
confide himself to England. Then the Emperor 
said : " If it were a question of marching to the con- 
quest of an empire, or of saving one, I might attempt 
a return to the Island of Elba ; but I desire nothing 
but repose. And if I were again the cause of even a 
single discharge of cannon, spite would profit by the 
circumstance to destroy me. I am offered repose in 
England. I do not know the Prince Regent, but 
from what I have been told, I cannot distrust the 
loyalty of his character. My decision is made. I 
am going to write to him ; and to-morrow, at day- 
break, we will go on board the English vessel." 

All retired to make their preparations for de- 
parture. It was then Napoleon wrote to the Prince 
Regent of England the letter which will be famous 
for all time : — 

"Royal Highness : Exposed to the factions 
which divide my country, and to the enmity of the 
greatest European Powers, I have ended my political 
career, and am going, like Themistocles, to sit down 
beside the hearths of the British people. I place my- 
self under the protection of their laws, which I claim 
frorri Your Royal Highness, as the. most powerful, 
the most constant, and the most generous of my 
enemies." 



234 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



General Gourgaud was charged with carrying the 
memorable letter to the Prince Regent, and received 
the following instructions : — 

" My aide-de-camp Gourgaud will present himself 
on board the English squadron with Count de Las 
Cases. According to the instructions he receives 
from the commander of this squadron, he will go 
either to the admiral or to London. He will try to 
obtain an audience of the Prince Regent, and deliver 
my letter to him. If there is no inconvenience in 
giving me passports to the United States of America, 
that is what I desire ; but I do not want them to go 
to any colony. If America is impossible, I prefer 
England to any other country. I will assume the 
title of Colonel Muiron or Duroc. If I am to go to 
England, I would like to live in a country house, ten 
or twelve leagues from London, where I am anxious 
to arrive in the strictest possible disguise. The 
house should be large enough to accommodate all 
my servants. I am desirous to avoid London, and in 
this the government would doubtless agree with me. 
If the Ministry desire to place a commissary near 
me, Gourgaud will take care that this shall carry 
with it no appearance of captivity, and that he shall 
be a man whose rank and character cannot possibly 
give occasion for evil thoughts. If Gourgaud is to 
go to the admiral, it would be better for the captain 
to keep him on board until he can be sent in a cor- 
vette, so as to be sure to reach London before us. 

" Napoleon. 

" Island of Aix, July 14, 1815." 



BOCHEFORT. 235 



Las Cases, accompanied by General Gourgaud, 
started about four o'clock in the afternoon for the 
BellerojjJion, His mission was to announce that the 
Emperor would come on board the next morning, 
and to give Captain Maitland a copy of Napoleon's 
letter to the Prince Regent. This letter, worthy of 
one of Plutarch's heroes, was greatly admired by 
the English seaman, who allowed two other captains 
to take copies of it, under the seal of privacy until 
it should be made public. He despatched General 
Gourgaud at once to London on the corvette Slany. 
But hardly had this vessel started, when Maitland, 
his face and voice greatly altered, exclaimed : 
"'Count de Las Cases, I have been tricked. When 
I am treating with you, when I am depriving myself 
of a corvette, I am told that Napoleon has just es- 
caped. That will put me in a frightful predicament 
with my government." 

Las Cases gave a start. What would he not have 
given that the news were true ! But it was not. 
" At what hour is it pretended that the Emperor got 
off ? " he asked Captain Maitland. " At noon." 
" Reassure yourself ; I left the Emperor at the Island 
of Aix this afternoon, at four o'clock." " You posi- 
tively declare that to me ? " "I give you my word." 

Turning to some officers near by. Captain Mait- 
land said to them in English: "The news must be 
false. Count de Las Cases is too calm. He looks 
too honest, and besides, he has just given me his 
word of honor." 



236 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Nothing further was said except in relation to the 
next day. " Would you like me to send my boats 
for the Emperor ? " asked Maitland. " No," returned 
Las Cases. " The separation is already too painful to 
the French seamen. We must leave them the satisfac- 
tion of guarding the Emperor up to the last minute." 

Saturday^ July 15. In the morning, Napoleon was 
beginning to dress when General Beker hurried in to 
announce that an emissary had just arrived at Roche- 
fort commissioned to arrest him. There was not a 
single minute to lose. At daybreak. Napoleon, at last 
making up his mind to go, went down to the shore, 
and after receiving the sad farewells of a pitying 
throng, embarked with his companions in the vessels 
which took them to the brig Epervier^ whence they 
were to go on board the Bellerophon. 

Before entering the JEpervier the Emperor bade 
adieu to General Beker, for whom he had only words 
of praise, and who wept. " General," said he, " I thank 
you for your noble and delicate conduct. Why did 
I know you so late ? You ought never to have left 
my person. Be happy, and transmit to France the 
expression of my good wishes." The General begged 
to be allowed to go with him as far as the Bellerophon. 
" No," replied the Emperor. " I do not know what 
the English have in store for me ; but if they betray 
my confidence, it will be said that you delivered me 
to my enemies." 

Profiting by the low tide to get out of the road- 
stead of Aix and into that of the Basques, where the 



ROCHEFORT. 237 



Bellerophon lay at anchor, Napoleon reached the ship 
with diJBQculty, because the weather was too calm. 
Captain Maitland, full of impatience, was sweeping 
the horizon with his glass to see whether the illus- 
trious captive was approaching. He sent a yawl to 
meet him, and the Emperor got into it from the brig 
Epervier, From that moment he ceased to be a free 
man ; he became the prisoner of his most implacable 
enemies. On board the Epervier there was a pro- 
longed groaning, broken by cries of '' Long live the 
Emperor ! " All the sailors wept, and kept their 
eyes fixed on the great man who was boarding the 
Bellerophon, 



XIV. 



THE BELLEROPHON. 



WHEN the Emperor came aboard the Bellero- 
pJion^ Las Cases, who was at the ladder, pre- 
sented Captain Maitland. Napoleon, raising his hat, 
said in a firm voice, "I come on board your ship to 
put myself under the protection of the laws of Eng- 
land." Captain Maitland, after having introduced his 
officers, conducted the Emperor to his cabin, of which 
he put him in possession. The Emperor was accom- 
panied by Generals Bertrand, Savary, Lallemand, and 
Montholon, Count de Las Cases and his son, and the 
Countesses Bertrand and Montholon. The first of 
these ladies had three children with her ; the second 
had one. To these must be added nine officers of 
inferior rank and thirty-nine domestics. The princi- 
pal personages were received on the Bellerophon, the 
others on the corvette Myrmidon, commanded by 
Captain Gambler. 

Toward three in the afternoon the Superb, a 

seventy-four-gun ship, commanded by Admiral Ho- 

tham, entered the anchorage. It had come from the 

roadstead of Quiberon into that of the Basques. 

238 



THE BELLEROPHON. 239 

The Admiral visited the Emperor on board the Bel- 
lerophon, and begged that he would honor him by 
breakfasting on the Superb the following day with all 
his suite. Napoleon accepted. 

Sunday^ July 16, 1815. Let us leave the account 
to Las Cases : " As he started, in the morning, to 
go on board Admiral Hotham's ship, the Emperor 
stopped short on the bridge of the Bellerophon before 
the soldiers drawn up in his honor. He made them 
go through their drill several times, and as their 
manner of charging bayonets was not precisely like 
that of the French, he went quickly into the midst of 
the soldiers, pushing aside their bayonets with his 
two hands, and seized a musket from one in the rear 
rank, with which he performed the evolution himself 
in our fashion. A sudden change of expression 
appeared on the faces of the soldiers, the officers, and 
all the spectators : it expressed their astonishment at 
seeing the Emperor place himself thus in the midst 
of English bayonets, some of which touched his 
breast. This circumstance made a vivid impression." 
Napoleon drilling English soldiers on board the Bel- 
lerophon — would not that be a good subject for a 
military picture? 

Afterwards, the Emperor went on board the Superb. 
The ship was in full dress. The bridge was covered 
with a richly decorated tent canopied with the Eng- 
lish standard. Ordinary labors on the vessel were 
intermitted. A fine band was playing on the poop. 
The sailors in uniform were on the yards. Admiral 



240 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Hotham presented each of his officers by name to the 
Emperor. This ceremony over, he showed him the 
batteries and then offered him an extremely well- 
served breakfast. Afterwards he proposed to him to 
remain on the Superb^ which was larger and more 
commodious than the Bellerophon. Napoleon refused 
this offer out of good feeling, not wishing to pain 
Captain Maitland, whose kindness he appreciated : he 
returned the same day to the Belleroplion. 

Monday^ July 17. The Bellerophon and the cor- 
vette Myrmidon weighed anchor and made sail for 
England. The winds were poor, and they did not 
lose sight of land. 

Tuesday^ July 18, to Saturday^ July 22. The 
voyage was slow. It was with difficulty that they 
got into the English Channel in going up the French 
coast. Napoleon appeared gentle and affable. His 
calmness and the equability of his temper gained 
the approbation of everybody. He used to stay on 
deck for the greater part of the day, conversing at 
length with Captain Maitland, seizing occasions to 
say agreeable things, and talking of the English navy, 
whose skill he admired, and the English army, whose 
rare steadfastness he praised. He spoke also, and 
with great affection, of his wife and son, complaining 
of his separation from them; he showed their por- 
traits to Captain Maitland, with tears in his eyes. 
His health was good, but he was subject to drowsi- 
ness. Captain, officers, and crew had all speedily 
adopted toward him the same manners that were 



THE BELLEROPHON. 241 

observed by his suite ; the same deference, the same 
language, the same respect. The Captain always ad- 
dressed him as Sire or Majesty. Whenever he came 
on the bridge, every one removed his hat. No one 
was admitted to his table except at his invitation. 

Sunday, July 23. Toward four in the morning 
they sighted Ushant, which had been passed during 
the night. More than once the Emperor glanced 
sadly toward the coast of France, but he did not say 
a word. As they approached the Channel, English 
vessels were seen coming and going in all directions. 
By night England was in sight. 

Monday^ July 24. Toward eight in the morning 
they weighed anchor in the roadstead of Torbay. 
Alas ! it was not thus that, in the time when he 
camped at Boulogne, Napoleon had hoped to descend 
on the English coast ! From the poop of the Bel- 
leroplion he looked at the shore and the anchorage of 
the vessel. On entering the roadstead, which is very 
picturesque, ''This reminds me," said he, "of Porto- 
Ferrajo and the Island of Elba." Very soon after- 
wards. General Gourgaud presented himself. He 
had left Aix on the corvette Slany^ to carry a letter 
to the Prince Regent, but had not been able to dis- 
charge the commission : he had been obliged to give 
up the letter, and was not even permitted to land. 
This was a bad omen. 

Napoleon did not go ashore. He remained on 
board the Belleroplion in the road of Torbay. The 
ship had scarcely cast anchor when Captain Maitland 



242 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

received despatches from Lord Keith, Admiral of the 
Channel fleet, and shortly after from the Board of 
Admiralty, which enjoined him not to permit any one, 
no matter of what rank or station, to be on board the 
Bellei'ophon^ excepting the officers and sailors com- 
posing its crew. As soon as the Emperor's presence 
in the bay was made known, a crowd of small boats 
filled with curious people began to make their appear- 
ance. 

Tuesday^ July 25. Napoleon was struck with the 
multitude of persons in boats crowding about the ship 
in the hope of getting sight of him. He looked at 
them from his cabin, and sometimes went out on the 
bridge. No one suspected, as yet, the sorrowful fate 
which awaited the great man. Captain Maitland 
received a letter from Lord Keith, in which the fol- 
lowing passage occurs : " Say to the Emperor that I 
should be glad if he would let me know what would 
be agreeable to him ; I would willingly attend to it. 
Thank him on my behalf for the generous attentions 
he himself gave to my nephew, who was taken to him 
a prisoner after being wounded at Waterloo." 

Wednesday^ July 26. During the night of July 
25-26, the Bellerophon received orders to leave Tor- 
bay for Plymouth. Having weighed anchor very 
early, they arrived in the roadstead of that city at 
about four in the afternoon. Sinister presentiments 
began to circulate. Armed boats surrounded the 
ship, which was not visited by Admiral Keith, al- 
though he was in the bay. At the moment when 



THE BELLEROPHON. 243 

two English frigates cast anchor, one on either side 
of the Bellerophon, some one said in a whisper to 
Las Cases : " You see these frigates ? In the night 
they will carry off the Emperor and you, and sail 
for Saint Helena." 

Listen to this faithful courtier of misfortune : 
" No, never," he exclaims, " can I render the effect 
of these terrible words ! A cold sweat broke out on 
my body ; it was an unexpected sentence of death. 
Pitiless executioners had seized me for the torture ; 
I was to be torn violently from all that attached me 
to life ; sadly I extended my arms to all I held dear ; 
it was in vain ; perish I must. This thought and an 
unruly crowd of others raised a veritable tempest in 
me : it was the laceration of a soul seeking to free 
itself from its terrestrial alloy! It whitened my 
hair. . . . Happily the crisis was brief, and my soul 
came out victorious, — so entirely victorious that, 
from that moment, I felt myself superior to all that 
men could do. I felt that thereafter I could defy 
injustice, ill-treatment, torture. I swore, above all, 
that no one should ever hear from me either com- 
plaints or petitions. But let not those among us, to 
whom I must have seemed tranquil in these fatal 
circumstances, accuse me of a want of feeling ! 
Their agony was prolonged and in detail ; mine came 
all at once." 

As usual, the Emperor made his appearance on 
the bridge. His face betrayed neither emotion nor 
Uneasiness. 



244 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Thursday^ July 27. Again we leave the word to 
Las Cases : " It would be difficult to describe," he 
says, " our anxieties and torments : the greater num- 
ber of us seemed hardly to be living ; the least cir- 
cumstance from land, the most commonplace opinion 
of any one on board, the least authentic article, sup- 
plied us with subjects for the gravest arguments and 
caused continual oscillations between hope and fear. 
We sought to get favorable versions and deceitful 
anticipations from any one whatever, so little do the 
expansion and mobility of our national character 
incline us to that stoical resignation and impassible 
concentration which flow only from settled ideas and 
positive doctrine imbibed in childhood. 

" The public journals, the ministerial ones espe- 
cially, were let loose against us ; it was the halloo of 
the ministers preparing for the blow they meant to 
strike. It would not be easy to get an idea of the 
horrors, the lies, the imprecations, which piled up 
against us ; and it is well known that such things 
make an impression on the multitude, no matter how 
well disposed they may be. Hence the manners of 
those around us began to stiffen, their politeness 
seemed embarrassed, and their faces dubious." 

The Emperor maintained an imperturbable tran- 
quillity. His presence in the Bay of Plymouth pro- 
duced a prodigious effect. He was going to excite 
throughout all England a. sentiment of curiosity 
which amounted to frenzy. People came in crowds, 
as if on a pilgrimage, in the hope of seeing for an 



THE BELLEROPHON. 245 

instant the features of the legendary man. There 
were not horses enough on the road between London 
and Plymouth, so great was the throng of travellers 
who wanted to be able to say one day to their chil- 
dren : " I have seen Napoleon ! " 

Friday^ July 28. As he beheld the innumerable 
boats which pressed around the Bellerophon, the Em- 
peror, in the very midst of his misfortunes, had an 
intuition of his future glory. He perceived that his 
adversity, like his former power, would assume epic 
proportions, and that all poets would celebrate him. 

Listen to a Frenchman, Count de Las Cases, and 
to an Englishman,. Walter Scott, who both describe 
this eager thronging of the English people about the 
glorious captive. 

" It was known," says Las Cases, " that the Em- 
peror always came out on the bridge toward five 
o'clock. Some time beforehand the boats began to 
close in beside each other. There were thousands of 
them, and so close together that not a glimpse could 
be caught of the sea ; one might rather have believed 
that this crowd of spectators had assembled in some 
public square. On the appearance of the Emperor, 
the noises, the movements, the gestures, of so many 
people presented a singular spectacle. At the same 
time it was easy to see that there was nothing hostile 
in all this; if curiosity had brought them, interest 
would accompany them home. One could even see 
that this sentiment visibly increased. At first they 
were content to look ; afterwards they saluted ; some 



246 



ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 



kept their hats off; and sometimes they cheered. 
Even our emblems began to make their appearance : 
women and young men would arrive adorned with 
carnations." 

And now hear Walter Scott : " That popular curi- 
osity, bordering on fury, which prevails in all free 
states, but which seems carried to the greatest excess 
by the English nation, caused the sea around the 
BelleropTion to be covered with such a multitude of 
barks that in spite of the peremptory orders of the 
Admiralty and the efforts of the coast-guard vessels, 
it was almost impossible to keep them at the pre- 
scribed distance from the vessel, which was a cable's 
length. The persons on these boats ran the risk of 
sinking and of being killed (at least they might fear 
it, for several shots were fired to intimidate them) ; 
they exposed themselves, in a word, to all the dan- 
gers of a naval combat, rather than lose the oppor- 
tunity of seeing the Emperor, of whom they had so 
often heard. When he appeared, he was received 
with acclamations, to which he responded by salutes ; 
but he could not avoid displaying his surprise at the 
excess of a curiosity which he had never seen mani- 
fest itself with so much vivacity." 

Saturday^ July 29. The crowd of curious specta- 
tors was even greater than on the previous day. 
Thousands of small crafts surrounded the BelleropJion 
and passed hours in the roadstead, running against 
each other and exposed to grave dangers. 

Sunday^ July 30. One of the under-secretaries of 



THE BELLEROPHON. 247 

State, Sir Henry Bunbury, arrived from London. 
He brought the definite resolutions of the English 
government. 

Monday^ July 31. Lord Keith and Sir Henry 
Bunbury came on board the Belleroplion^ and, in the 
name of the English Ministry, acquainted Napoleon 
with the following communication ; — 

"As it may be agreeable to General Buonaparte 
to learn, without further delay, the intentions of 
the British Government in his case. Your Lordship 
will communicate the subjoined information to him : 
It would be little in conformity with our duties 
towards our country and the Allied Powers, for us 
to leave General Buonaparte the means or the oppor- 
tunity to trouble again the peace of Europe. This is 
why it becomes absolutely necessary that he should 
be restrained in his personal liberty, so » far as this 
first and important object may require. The Island 
of Saint Helena has been selected for his future 
residence. Its climate is healthy, and its situation 
will permit of his being treated with more indulgence 
than could be shown elsewhere, in view of the in- 
dispensable precaution which would be necessary to 
secure his person. General Buonaparte is permitted 
to choose among those who accompanied him to Eng- 
land, with the exception of Generals Savary and 
Lallemand, three officers who, together with his sur- 
geon, will be permitted to accompany him to Saint 
Helena, and cannot leave the island without the sanc- 
tion of the British Government. Rear-Admiral Sir 



248 ELBA, AND THE HUNDBEB BAYS. 

George Cockburn, who is named commander-in-chief 
of the Cape of Good Hope and the adjacent seas, 
will conduct General Buonaparte and his suite to 
Saint Helena, and will receive detailed instructions 
concerning the execution of the service. Sir George 
Cockburn will probably be ready to start in a few 
days; for this reason it is desirable that General 
Buonaparte should, without delay, make choice of 
the persons who are to accompany him." 

This painful document was read aloud in French 
by Sir Henry Bunbury. Napoleon listened to it 
without any sign of emotion or impatience. When 
it was ended, he was asked, like a condemned man 
to whom his sentence has just been read, whether 
he had any observations to make. Then he began 
to speak quietly, declaring, with great coolness, 
that he protested solemnly against the orders just 
read; that the English Ministry had no right to 
dispose in this way of his person ; that he appealed 
to the nation and the laws, and asked to what tri- 
bunal he should carry this appeal. "I came," said 
he, "to confide myself voluntarily to the hospitality 
of your nation. I am not a prisoner of war; and 
even if I were, I should have a right to be treated 
according to the law of nations. I came as a passen- 
ger on one of your vessels, after preliminary negoti- 
ations with its commander. If he had told me I 
would be made a prisoner, I should not have come. 
I asked him if he would receive me on board and 
carry me to England. He answered yes, having re- 



THE BELLEROPHON. 249 

ceived, or pretending to have received, precise orders 
from his government. Was it then a trap you were 
laying for me? I went aboard an English vessel as 
1 would have entered an English town : a vessel, a 
village, it is all the same thing. As to Saint Helena, 
it would be my death sentence. ... I could not 
live there three months. I am accustomed to walk 
twenty miles a day. What would become of me on 
that little rock at the end of the world? No; Botany 
Bay is preferable to Saint Helena. And what good 
would my death do you ? I am no longer a sover- 
eign. What danger could arise from my living as 
a private person in the interior of England, subject 
to such restrictions as the government should deem 
suitable ? " 

Lord Keith and Sir Henry Bunbury made no re- 
mark, save to call the Emperor's attention to the fact 
that their mission was solely to communicate to him 
the document to which he had just listened. 

Napoleon proceeded without interruption, insisting 
on his preference for England and his desire to in- 
trust himself to it rather than to any other nation. 
" Otherwise," said he, " why should I not have gone 
to my father-in-law, or to the Emperor Alexander, 
who is my personal friend? We fell out because he 
wanted to annex Poland, and my popularity with the 
Poles embarrassed him. But in other respects Jie was 
my friend, and he would not have treated me in this 
fashion. If your government acts in this way, it will 
disgrace you in the eyes of Europe. Your people 



250 ELBA, AND THE HUNDEEB DAYS. 

themselves will blame it. You do not know, more- 
over, what a sensation my death would cause, both in 
France and Italy. At present they have a high opin- 
ion of England in both those countries. If you kill 
me, that opinion will be destroyed, and many English 
lives will pay for mine. Who could have forced me 
to the step I took ? The tricolor was still floating at 
Bordeaux, Nantes, and Rochefort. The army has 
not even yet made its submission. Very well ; if I 
had preferred to remain in France, who could have 
prevented me from remaining concealed there for 
years in the midst of a people so attached to me ? " 

Then, recalling his glory and past splendors: 
" Remember," said he, " what I have been and what 
place I have taken among European sovereigns. 
This one solicited my protection ; that one gave me 
his daughter ; all sought for my friendship. I was 
recognized as Emperor by all the Powers of Europe, 
England excepted, and that recognized me as First 
Consul. Your government has no right to style me 
G-eneral Buonaparte, I am either Prince or Consul. 
I should be treated as such, and not otherwise. 
When I was at Elba, I was as much a sovereign in 
that island as Louis XYIII. was in France. We had 
our respective flags, our vessels, and our troops. 
Mine were less numerous, it is true. I had six 
hundred men, and he had two hundred thousand. 
Finally, I made war on him. I was defeated and 
dethroned. That affords no excuse for depriving me 
of my rank as a European sovereign." 



THE BELLEROPHON. 251 

Napoleon concluded by saying : " No ! no ! I will 
not go to Saint Helena. I am not a Hercules, but 
you will not take me there. I prefer death here, 
even. You found me free ; send me back, replace 
me in the same condition, or let me go to America." 

A legitimist historian, M. Alfred Nettement, thus 
appreciates Napoleon's remarks : " Several things are 
to be considered in these words of the Emperor. In 
the first place, the discernment, the calculation, with 
which he prepares the role he wishes to play in his- 
tory. His letter, graven in marble by that character 
of antique grandeur which he knew how to give his 
style, is written for posterity, who will read it over 
the Regent's shoulder. In reality, the Emperor made 
use in an inevitable action (for he had been the pris- 
oner of England from the time he went to the Island 
of Aix) of that supreme art which, in the days of his 
power, he knew how to impress on all he did ; like 
the antique gladiator, he draped himself when fall- 
ing. Nor is this all. At the moment when he loses 
his sword in his implacable duel with England, he 
recommences by speech that duel which he will con- 
tinue with the pen on the rock of Saint Helena, in 
dedicating England to the execration of posterity. 
The anathema, to which he will add each day a 
malediction and an accusing groan, begins* on the 
Belleroplion. But what is most instructive and finest 
in his words is that tardy appeal to law, to justice, 
and to equity, an appeal full of lessons in the mouth 
of the man of force and absolute power." 



252 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

After his interview with Lord Keith and Sir Henry 
Bunbury, Napoleon showed himself as usual on the 
bridge. He was absolutely calm. But despair over- 
came his unfortunate companions. Generals Savary 
and Lallemand, excluded from the amnesty by the 
government of Louis XVIIL, who reserved them for 
punishment like Ney and Labedoydre, interpreted in 
the most sinister way the refusal to allow them to 
accompany the Emperor to Saint Helena. They 
were persuaded that England would deliver them to 
the French Royalists, who would destroy them. 

Tuesday^ August 1. The crowd of boats which fol- 
lowed each other continually into the bay, and which 
never numbered less than a thousand at a time, were 
held with difficulty at the prescribed distance from 
the Bellerophon^ by the vessels ordered to prevent 
them, by force if necessary, from coming nearer. 
This multitude alarmed the English naval authori- 
ties, especially since Napoleon had declared he would 
not go to Saint Helena: they were afraid he might 
try to escape. Two frigates were sent to watch and 
protect the Bellerophon. The sentinels were doubled 
and tripled by day and night. 

The members of the Emperor's suite observed the 
same etiquette with him as in the Tuileries. Grand 
Marshal Bertrand and General Savary, Duke of Ro- 
vigo, alone saw him habitually. There were some 
who had hardly approached him since they left Paris, 
nor spoken to him more frequently than if he were 
still living in an imperial palace. 



THE BELLEROPHON. 253 

In the evening, M. de Las Cases was translating 
the English newspapers to Napoleon when General 
Bertrand's wife, without having been summoned, and 
without having herself announced, suddenly rushed 
into the Emperor's cabin. She was beside herself. 
" Sire," she cried, " do not go to Saint Helena. Do 
not take away my husband." Napoleon's calmness 
troubled her still more. She went out as precipi- 
tately as she had entered. A few moments later 
great cries were heard and a movement of the crew, 
who were running noisily toward the stern of the 
ship. Madame Bertrand had tried to throw herself 
overboard. 

Wednesday^ August 2. M. de Las Cases learned 
that Napoleon had chosen him as one of his compan- 
ions to Saint Helena. The Duke of Rovigo repeated 
to him Napoleon's kindly words. Las Cases says : 
"Savary loved the Emperor sincerely; I knew his 
heart, his soul, his uprightness; he seemed to me 
capable of true friendship. We should, doubtless, 
have been intimately united. May he never under- 
stand the sentiments and the regrets he has bequeathed 
me. 

Thursday^ August 3. In the evening the Emperor 
caused Las Cases to be summoned. "What good could 
Saint Helena be?" said he. "Would it be possible 
to support life there ? After all, is it certain that I 
shall go? Is a man dependent on other men when 
he chooses not to be so ? . . . My dear fellow, some- 
times I long to leave you, and it would not be difS- 



254 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

cult. All that would be necessary would be to get a 
little excited and I should soon escape. All would 
be over, and you could quietly rejoin your families." 

Doubtless Napoleon forgot at this moment that 
order of the day of Flor^al 22, Year X., in which he 
had said, apropos of the suicide of a soldier of the 
Consular Guard : — 

" The First Consul decrees that it shall be put on 
the regulations of the Guard that a soldier ought to 
know how to subdue the suffering and the melancholy 
of the passions ; and that there is as much true cour- 
age in enduring with constancy the pains of the soul 
as remaining steadfast on the ramparts of a fortress. 
To abandon one's self to chagrin without resistance, 
to kill one's self in order to get rid of it, is to quit 
the field of battle before having conquered." 

Las Cases vigorously combated the idea of suicide 
which seemed to tempt the Emperor. He developed 
in eloquent language the noblest considerations. 
Poets and philosophers had declared that to see a 
man struggling with misfortune is a spectacle worthy 
of the gods. Reverses and steadfastness have alike 
their glory ; a character so noble and grand as that of 
Napoleon could not lower itself to the level of the 
most vulgar souls ; he who had governed with ao 
much splendor, who had been admired by the world 
and controlled its destinies, must not end like a 
despairing gamester or a deceived lover. What 
would become in that case of those who believed and 
hoped in him? Was not the extreme longing dis- 



THE BELLEROPHON. 255 

played by such persons a sufficient motive for endur- 
ance ? Moreover, who could penetrate into the secrets 
of time? Who would dare affirm anything about 
the future? 

Napoleon replied : " Some things you say are inter- 
esting. But what could we do at Saint Helena, that 
desolate spot?" "Sire, we would live in the past; 
there is enough in it to satisfy us. Do we not enjoy 
the lines of Csesar and Alexander ? We shall have 
something better still : you will re-peruse your career, 
Sire." " Well, yes ; you are right ; we will write our 
memoirs. Yes, we must get to work; work also is 
the scythe of time. After all, we must fulfil our 
destiny : that is my great doctrine." And regaining 
from that moment an easy and even cheerful aspect, 
the Emperor turned the conversation to matters 
entirely unconnected with his existing situation. 

Friday^ August 4. In the night of August 3-4, 
the captain of the Bellerophon received orders to sail 
early the next morning. They got under way and 
sailed eastward up the Channel. The Bellerophon 
was too old a ship for such a voyage as that to 
Saint Helena, and besides she lacked the necessary 
stores. They were to rejoin another vessel. 

During the day the Emperor wrote the following 
protest : " I solemnly protest here, before Heaven and 
men, against the violation of my most sacred rights 
and the use of force in disposing of my person. 
I came freely on board the Bellerophon ; I am not 
the prisoner, but the guest, of England. I came at 



256 ELBA, AND THE HUNBBEI) BAYS. 

the instigation of the captain, who said he had orders 
to receive me on board and take me to England if 
that were agreeable to me. I presented myself in 
good faith. Seated on the deck of the Bellerophon^ 
I was at the fireside of the British people. If, in 
giving the captain of the Belleroplion orders to receive 
me and my suite, the government intended to lay an 
ambush for me, it has forfeited its honor and tar- 
nished its flag. This act once consummated, it will 
be in vain for the English to boast hereafter of 
their loyalty, their laws, and their liberty. British 
faith will have perished in the hospitality of the 
Bellerophon. I appeal from it to history; she will 
say that an enemy who had fought the English 
people for twenty years went of his own accord, 
when in misfortune, to seek asylum under the pro- 
tection of their laws. What more striking proof 
could he have given of his esteem and confidence? 
But how did the English respond to such magna- 
nimity? They pretended to extend a hospitable hand 
to this enemy; and when he had taken it in good 
faith, they immolated him. Napoleon. 

" On board the Bellerophon. At sea." 
What struck Chateaubriand most in this protest 
was the date and the signature. "On board the 
Bellerophon, at sea. Napoleon." "These are the 
harmonies of immensity," says the prose-poet. 

In going out of Plymouth the Bellerophon had first 
steered east with a stern breeze. Presently it drew 
closer to the wind, hugging the shore and cruising 



THE BELLEROPHON. 257 

about. The passengers did not understand the object 
of these manoeuvres. 

Saturday^ August 5. This day went by in the 
same manner as the previous one. 

Sunday^ August 6. Toward noon the Bellerophon 
anchored in the roadstead of Start Point, where it 
was not in safety, Avhereas in that of Torbay, which 
was very near, it would have been excellently placed. 
It was very soon evident why it did not go to Torbay. 
At Start Point they were about to be joined by the 
Northumberland^ which was to convey Napoleon to 
Saint Helena. A few instants later this vessel ap- 
peared, and also two frigates crowded with troops 
destined to garrison the island. The ship Thunderer 
also came up, on which was floating the ensign of 
Lord Keith, the chief admiral of the naval station. 
During the day Lord Keith and Sir George Cockburn 
came aboard the Bellerophon and remitted to the 
Emperor a copy of the instructions they had received. 
These enjoined that on the following day Napoleon 
and the members of his suite should be disarmed, their 
baggage searched, and their money seized and held 
in trust. 

The Emperor had only three hundred and fifty 
thousand francs in gold, and the diamond necklace 
which Queen Hortense had forced him to accept 
when he left Malmaison. The necklace was in- 
trusted to Las Cases, who concealed it about his 
person. As to the gold, it was divided among the 
domestics, who hid it in their clothing, with the ex- 



258 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED BAYS. 

ception of eighty thousand francs, which sum was 
all that was seized on by the custom house agent. 
Napoleon selected Bertrand, Las Cases, and Mon- 
tholon to accompany him. Gourgaud, in despair at 
being left behind, negotiated and succeeded. The 
instructions of the Admiralty did not permit the 
Emperor to take more than three officers. It was 
agreed to consider Las Cases a civilian, and, thanks 
to this interpretation, Gourgaud was admitted as a 
fourth person. As to his sword. Napoleon swore to 
himself that if they wished to take it from him, they 
would have to tear it away by force. 

Monday^ August 7. The moment for quitting the 
Bellerophon arrived. Toward eleven in the morning 
Lord Keith came in his long-boat. At one o'clock 
Napoleon made known that he was ready ; Lord 
Keith's long-boat, which was to take him aboard the 
Northumberland^ was waiting for him. He embraced 
the Duke of Rovigo, who, all in tears, threw himself 
at his feet and kissed his hands. He embraced Gen- 
eral Lallemand also: "Be happy, my friends," he 
said to them. " We shall never see each other again, 
but my thoughts will never leave you nor any of 
those who have served me. Tell France that I pray 
for her." When he crossed the quarter-deck of the 
BelleropTion^ the soldiers presented arms during three 
rolls of the drum. His step was firm and measured. 
He bade a polite and even friendly farewell to Cap- 
tain Maitland, who was as greatly moved as if he 
had been French. " People may be astonished," said 



THE BELLEROPHON. 259 

this brave seaman afterwards, "that there still re- 
mained an English officer prepossessed in favor of a 
man who had wrought so much harm to England. 
But Napoleon possessed the art of pleasing in such 
a high degree, that there are very few persons who, 
if, like me, they had been seated at his table almost 
a month, would not have experienced a sentiment of 
pity, and even of regret, in beholding a man endowed 
with such alluring qualities, and who had occupied 
such an elevated station in the world, reduced to the 
condition in which I saw him." 

Calm, and full of dignity, the Emperor, on his 
way to the boat which was to take him to the 
Northumberland^ bowed graciously to all who sur- 
rounded him. Those among the French who had 
obtained leave to follow him to Saint Helena seemed 
proud and happy ; the others melted into tears. 
Las Cases said at this moment to Lord Keith : " You 
will observe, my Lord, that those who weep are those 
who are left behind." 



XV. 



THE NOETHUMBEKLAND. 



AT the moment when the Emperor was about to 
leave the Bellerophon for the Northumberland^ 
Admiral Keith said to him, with sorrowful respect, 
" General, England orders me to demand your 
sword." To this demand Napoleon responded by a 
glance so haughty that the Admiral dared not insist. 
The giant of battles kept his glorious sword. He 
was received on the Northumberland with the same 
honors as had been paid him on quitting the Beller- 
ophon. The following day, August 8, 1815, the day 
of his departure for Saint Helena, he embraced once 
more those of his companions in misfortune who had 
not obtained authorization to follow him into cap- 
tivity, but who were permitted to come and pay him 
their last homage on board the Northumberland, 
Among the number was Savary. The Emperor spe- 
cially charged him to say to Captain Maitland that 
he had desired to give him some token of remem- 
brance, and regretted having been rendered unable 
to do so ; for the rest, he felt no resentment toward 
him on account of what had occurred, because that 

260 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND. 261 



was a matter which lay beyond his power. ''I do 
not believe," he added, '' that the Captain knowingly 
deceived me. On the contrary, I have seen in him 
so many evidences of honorable feeling as to per- 
suade me that he is particularly grieved that the 
confidence I placed in his flag became the snare of 
my ill-fortune, and that he was made the instrument 
of a most shameful infraction of honor and morality 
and every law respected by the least uncivilized 
nations." 

Shortly afterwards, while the Bellerophon and the 
Thunderer sailed for Plymouth, the Northumberland 
got under way for Saint Helena, which it was not to 
reach until October 15. When the vessel passed the 
heights of the Cape of La Hogue, Napoleon recog- 
nized the coasts of France. He saluted them, ex- 
tending his hands toward the shore, and crying, with 
a voice full of emotion : " Adieu, land of heroes ! 
Adieu, dear France ! A few less traitors, and you 
would be the mistress of the world ! " 

The English were about to put the captive upon a 
gigantic pedestal. Without knowing it, and in spite 
of themselves, those who tortured him were to be- 
come the courtiers of his glory. The rock of Saint 
Helena, as serviceable to his memory as the prison of 
the Conciergerie was to that of Marie Antoinette, 
was far preferable to the hospitality he might have 
received in this or that English palace. The author 
of the G-Snie du Christianisme had reason for saying : 
'' What r61e could the fugitive, perhaps also feted, have 



262 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

played beside the Thames, in sight of France invaded, 
and Wellington dictator in the Louvre ? The high 
destiny of Napoleon served him better. The English, 
in allowing themselves to be carried away by a nar- 
row and bitter policy, failed of their final triumph. 
Instead of ruining their suppliant by throwing open 
to him their prisons or their banquets, they made the 
crown they had torn away more brilliant than ever in 
the eyes of posterity. He grew greater in his captiv- 
ity on account of the immense terror of the Powers. 
In vain did the ocean enchain him ; armed Europe 
encamped upon the shore, its eyes fastened on the 
sea." 

Is it not remarkable to see Chateaubriand, the 
author of Buonaparte et les Bourbons^ that brochure 
which was worth more than an army to Louis 
XVIIL, thus making admiration succeed to anger, 
and coming back at various times to the same reflec- 
tion ? " The Emperor," he says again, " made a mis- 
take in the interests of his memory when he desired 
to remain in Europe. There he could have been 
nothing but a prisoner, vulgar or dishonored. His 
old part was played out ; but, that part ended, a new 
position prepared for him a new renown. No man 
who has made a universal fame has had an end equal 
to that of Napoleon. He cannot be called, as he was 
after his first downfall, the autocrat of certain iron 
and marble quarries, of which these might furnish 
him a statue and those a sword. An eagle, they gave 
him a rock, on whose point he stood, sunbeaten, until 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND. 263 

his death, and from whence he was seen by all the 
earth." 

During the voyage the Emperor was calm, resigned, 
and showed the most exquisite politeness to all his 
attendants and to the English. The latter refused 
him the titles of Sire, Emperor, or Majesty. They 
addressed him as General or Your Excellency. 

Las Cases thus describes the interior of the ship : 
"The space behind the mizzen mast contained two 
common and two private cabins. The first of the two 
former was the dining-room, about ten feet wide, and 
the whole width of the vessel in length; it was 
lighted by a porthole at each end and a large sky- 
light. The saloon occupied all the room remaining 
after two cabins, exactly similar to each other, had 
been cut off from it to left and right. Each of these 
had one door into the dining-room and another into 
the saloon. The Emperor occupied the left-hand one, 
where his campaign bed had been set up ; the Admi- 
ral had the other. It had been strictly provided that 
the saloon should be common and not given to the 
Emperor for his private use: the Ministers were 
anxiously afraid of even so trifling a deference." 

And here is the description of the dining-table, 
which followed the shape of the cabin : " The Empe- 
ror sat with his back to the saloon, facing toward the 
bow of the vessel ; on his left was Madame Bertrand, 
on his right the Admiral ; on the right of the Admiral 
sat Madame de Montholon. The table turned at this 
point. On the short side the commander of the ves- 



264 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

sel, Captain Ross, was seated, and opposite to him, 
on the corresponding side, M. de Montholon beside 
Madame Bertrand ; then came the purser. The side 
opposite the Emperor, beginning at the captain of the 
ship, was occupied by the Grand Marshal, the General, 
the Colonel of the 53d, myself, and Baron Gourgaud. 
Every day the Admiral invited one or two officers, 
who sat between us. I was almost opposite the 
Emperor. The band of the 53d, which had been but 
recently recruited, played during the whole dinner 
time, much to our annoyance." 

The English have the habit of sitting a long time 
at table, after dessert, to drink and chat. The Em- 
peror, who detested long m,eals, could not conform to 
this custom. From the first day, he rose at once 
after the coffee and went out on the bridge. As Sir 
George Cockburn appeared to be somewhat aston- 
ished at this, Madame Bertrand said to him, " Do not 
forget. Admiral, that you are dealing with one who 
has been master of the world, and to whose table 
kings begged the honor of being admitted." " That 
is true," returned the Admiral, who was a courteous 
and well-bred man. After that he abridged the 
length of the courses, and caused coffee to be served 
before the usual time to the Emperor and those who 
went out with him. Napoleon left the table as soon 
as he finished eating. The English rose and re- 
mained standing until he left the dining-saloon, and 
then sat down again to chat and drink for another 
hour. 



THE NOBTHUMBERLAND. 265 

The Emperor walked on the bridge until nightfall ; 
afterwards he re-entered the saloon, where he played 
cards for half an hour, and then retired. 

" Napoleon's fete, which w\as also his birthday, 
came round during the voyage," says Walter Scott. 
" It was the fifteenth of August, a day for which the 
Pope had expressly canonized a Saint Napoleon to 
be the Emperor's patron. And now, strange revolu- 
tion ! he was celebrating his fete on board an English 
man-of-war, wliich was conveying him to the place of 
his exile, which was also to be the place of his tomb. 
Yet Napoleon appeared gay and contented through- 
out the voyage, and saw with pleasure that he was 
successful at cards, which seemed to him a good 
omen." In the morning all his companions in mis- 
fortune, having asked permission to enter his cabin, 
came in together. " The Emperor could not guess 
the reason," says Las Cases. "It was his fete, but 
he had not thought of it. We had been accustomed 
on this anniversary to see him in larger places, re- 
plenished with the tokens of his power ; but we had 
never brought him more sincere good wishes, nor 
hearts more full of him." 

The next day, August 16, they doubled Cape 
Finisterre ; on the 18th, Cape Saint Vincent ; on the 
19th, they passed across the Straits of Gibraltar. On 
the succeeding days they sailed along the coast of 
Africa towards Madeira. On the 27th, they passed 
tne Canaries, and on the 29th, crossed the tropic. On 
September 1, they passed the Islands of Cape Verde. 



266 ELBA, AND THE HUN DEED DAYS. 



The days followed one another, sad and monoto- 
nous. The heat was oppressive, and the sea often 
rough. Napoleon slept badly. He rose often in the 
night, seeking a refuge from insomnia and grief in 
reading. Shut up in his cabin, he spent his morn- 
ings in reading or writing, and his evenings in walk- 
ing on the bridge. He used often to go and lean 
against the next to last cannon on the left side of the 
vessel, near the gangway. Presently the whole crew 
were calling it the Emperor's cannon. Chatting 
with this or that one of his attendants in misfortune, 
he passed in review the places of his existence, at once 
bizarre and grandiose, which had in it something of 
legend, romance, and tragedy. Frequently his com- 
panions, transported by the eloquence of these re- 
citals, which, like his soul, were full of fire, begged 
him to dictate what he had told so well. " No, no," 
he responded, as if sick of Ids own story ; " let his- 
tory manage as best it can ! It may search out the 
truth if it wants to know it. The archives of State 
are full of it. France will find there the monuments 
of her glory, and, if she prizes them, let her busy her- 
self in preserving them from oblivion." Then, re- 
membering his most famous victories : " They are 
granite," said he. " The tooth of envy can do nothing 
with them." Las Cases, by calling his attention to 
the monotony of the hours, and the necessity of whil- 
ing away their dulness by work, at last induced him, 
on September 9, to dictate something about the siege 
of Toulon. Afterwards he dictated his recollections 
of the first Italian campaign. 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND, 267 



On September 23, they crossed the Line, by zero of 
latitude, zero of longitude, and zero of declination ; 
"a circumstance," says Las Cases, "which chance 
might not renew in a century, since it is necessary 
to arrive precisely at the first meridian toward noon, 
to pass the Line at the same hour, and to arrive 
there at the same time as the sun. This was a day of 
great mirth and much disorder for the whole crew ; 
it was the ceremony which our sailors call the baptism, 
and the English, the big shaving day. The sailors, 
arrayed in the most ridiculous costumes, conduct, 
with great ceremony, all those who have never crossed 
the Line to the feet of one of their number who 
personates Neptune. There one's beard is drenched 
with bilge water and shaved off with an immense 
razor. Pails of water thrown over you from all 
sides, and the rude laughter with which the crew 
accompany your flight, complete your initiation into 
the grand mysteries. Nobody escapes; even the 
officers are in some ways more badly used than the 
least of the sailors. We alone, by a perfect courtesy 
on the part of the Admiral, who, until then, had 
amused himself by making us dread this terrible 
ceremony, escaped its inconveniences and its ridicule. 
We were conducted, with every attention and respect, 
to the feet of the clumsy god, from whom each of us 
received a characteristic compliment : this was the 
extent of our trials. The Emperor was scrupulously 
respected throughout this saturnalia, which usually 
respects nothing and nobody. Having been apprised 



268 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DATS. 

of the ordinary custom and the deference displayed 
towards him, he ordered a hundred napoleons to be 
distributed to the grotesque Neptune and his attend- 
ants, but this the Admiral refused to concede, as 
much out of prudence as politeness." 

Apropos of this journey, Chateaubriand has said in 
his Memoires d'outre-tombe : " The sea which Napo- 
leon crossed was not that friendly sea which had 
borne him from the harbors of Corsica, the sands of 
Aboukir, and the rocks of Elba to the shores of 
Provence : it was that inimical ocean which, having 
hemmed him in in Germany, France, Portugal, and 
Spain, never opened before save to close in upon 
him from behind. It is probable that in feeling 
the waves impel his vessel, and the trade winds with 
their constant breathing blow him further on, he did 
not make the same reflections on his catastrophe 
which it inspires in me. Every man feels his life 
in his own way; he who gives the world a grand 
spectacle is less touched and instructed by it than 
the spectator. Occupied with the past as if it might 
revive again, hoping still in the midst of his recollec- 
tions, Bonaparte hardly noticed that he was crossing 
the Line : he did not ask what hand had traced the 
circles in which the spheres are constrained to im- 
prison their eternal march." 

However, the end of the voyage was approaching. 
Since the Emperor had begun to spend his mornings 
in dictation, of which he daily grew more fond, the 
hours had been less heavy to him. According to 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND. 269 



Las Cases, he would begin by seeming to distrust 
himself, saying that he would never be able to accom- 
plish anything. Then he would ponder for some 
minutes; then, rising and walking back and forth, 
he would begin to dictate. From that moment he 
was another man. Everything flowed straight from 
the source; he spoke as if by inspiration: expres- 
sions, places, dates, nothing retarded him. 

At last, on Sundaj', October 15, seventy days after 
leaving England, and one hundred and ten after 
leaving Paris, Napoleon perceived the Island of Saint 
Helena, which was to be his grave. He thought then 
of Corsica, which had been his cradle. Victor Hugo 
has said : — 

" These isles, where the surges pound 
Between the naked reefs, 
Are like two vessels of prey 
Chained to an eternal anchor. 
The hand that fixed the savage sites 
Of these black shores, 
And willed to cover them with dread, 
Made them so terrible, perhaps. 
That Bonaparte might there be born, 
And here Napoleon might die." 

But listen to Chateaubriand : — 

" On October 15, the Northumberland had reached 
the height of Saint Helena. The passenger went on 
the bridge; it was with difficulty that he descried 
an almost imperceptible black spot in the azure 
immensity; he took a spyglass; he observed this 
grain of earth as he had in other days observed a 



270 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

fortress in the middle of a lake. He saw the village 
of Saint James, closed in by precipitous rocks ; not 
a wrinkle in that sterile face in which a cannon was 
not hanging. It seemed as if the captive were to be 
received according to his own genius." 

The anchor was lowered toward midday. It 
touched bottom. In contemplating this island, the 
result of a volcanic eruption, which cast it into the 
middle of the ocean, with its inaccessible coasts and 
arid rocks, lifting their black crests to heaven, and 
dominated by the peak of Diana, which overlooks 
them all. Napoleon remained impassible. No one 
could surprise upon his countenance even the faintest 
trace of expression. Perhaps he understood that 
such a prison was worthy of a Titan thunder-stricken. 
In reality, he was not a subject for self-pity. As M. 
Veuillot has said : " Five years were to be accorded 
him to behold himself in the past and in the future, 
to justify or explain himself before men, to humble 
himself before God. During five years he remains 
upright on the threshold of the tomb; he descends 
into it step by step, surrounded by admiration, love, 
and pity, consecrated by expiation as he had been by 
glory." 

We lost sight long ago of the heroine of this study, 
Marie Louise. Was it not the fault of the faithless 
Empress, who, in this grandiose and terrible drama 
of the Hundred Days, and the second death-struggle 
of the Empire, never once lifted her voice to plead 
the cause of her husband and her son ? Not a letter ; 




NAPOLEON AT ST. HELENA 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND. 271 

not a line ; not a phrase to console the vanquished of 
Waterloo, the captive of the Bellerophon. The Eng- 
lish themselves were moved to pity. Marie Louise 
remained cold. Not a tear ; not a movement of com- 
passion ; well-being preferred to duty ; mean calcula- 
tions repelling magnanimous inspirations ; not one of 
those generous accents which from century to century 
would have re-echoed in the ears of posterity ! 

One is still more inclined to severity toward the 
former Regent of the Empire, the wife of Napoleon, 
and the mother of the King of Rome, when reading 
these two letters addressed to her by Prince Met- 
ternich : — 

"Paris, July 18, 1815. Madame: I promised, be- 
fore my departure from Vienna, to inform Your 
Imperial Majesty directly of whatever related to 
Napoleon's fate. You will see by the inclosed ex- 
tract from the Moniteur that he has surrendered 
himself to the English vessel, the Bellerophon^ after 
having vainly attempted to escape the vigilance of 
the cruisers in front of Rochefort. According to an 
arrangement made between the Powers, he will be 
imprisoned at Fort Saint George, in the north of 
Scotland, under the surveillance of Austrian, Prus- 
sian, French, and Russian commissioners. He will 
be very well treated, and given all the liberty com- 
patible with the completest certainty that he cannot 
escape." 

"August 13, 1815. Madame: Napoleon is on 
board the Northumberland^ on his way to Saint 



272 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

Helena. The only news we have of his departure 
from Torbay comes by telegraph ; but we know that 
it was out at sea that he left one vessel for the other. 
He was sent away on the Bellerophon because the 
crowd of sightseers increased so greatly about the 
vessel, that there was no certainty that there would 
not be a scandal." 

What dryness in these letters ! Not a word of 
pity for such a memorable misfortune ! Metternich 
still addresses Marie Louise as Imperial Majesty, 
while he calls the Emperor simply Napoleon. At 
least he might have said, "your husband," to the 
former Empress. Assuredly the astute Minister, the 
most skilful of courtiers, must have been very certain 
of her forgetfulness when he spoke to her of her 
husband in terms so laconic, so disdainful! The 
Austrian statesman knew very well that instead of 
desiring to be the companion of a captive, she had 
but one thought, — that of reigning at Parma, with 
General Neipperg as a morganatic prince-consort. 
The letters of the Minister of the Emperor Francis, 
coming after Napoleon's departure for Saint Helena, 
suggest painful reflections. It was here, then, that 
the marriage so much celebrated, so much exalted, 
which it was supposed would procure the happiness 
of Napoleon, the glory of France, and the repose and 
prosperity of the world, was to end ! 

Marie Louise did not even suspect the interest she 
still inspired in the last faithful adherents of the 
Napoleonic cause. Baron de Bausset, formerly pre- 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND. 273 



feet of the imperial palace, the only Frenchman who 
still remained near her, repeats the conversations he 
had at this time with a Polish count who had fought 
under Napoleon's standard, and who never spoke of 
the former Empress but as "my general's widow." 
She was a widow, in fact ; a widow during her hus- 
band's lifetime ! " So many confused ideas take pos- 
session of me," said the brave officer, "when I see 
her alone and pensive on her balcony, that I am 
tempted to weep, I have at once so much pleasure 
and so much pain in looking at her. There are days 
when, unable to resist my desire to see her son, I 
have myself driven out to Schoenbrunn. I have had 
the happiness of seeing him walking with his gov- 
ernor in the gardens of the palace, attended by a 
single footman. What beautiful fair hair! ... I 
looked at him well. . . . His eyes seem bluer than 
his father's. In the upper part of his face he has the 
features and the forehead of Napoleon; the others 
recall his mother. Alas ! I said to myself in looking 
at him, if that fatal Russian campaign had not been 
undertaken, what a brilliant destiny would have been 
reserved for this young child who now, separated 
from his father, is obliged to grow up in a strange 
land. . . . And we Poles, so frankly devoted and 
loyal to France, would not have been divided between 
three rival crowns, between whom and ourselves 
there exists no tie of habit or manners." 

To this recital Baron de Bausset adds : " I have no 
longer any answer to make to the Polish count; but 



274 ELBA, AND THE HUNDRED DAYS. 

he overwhelmed me, nevertheless, with a multitude 
of questions. Only, when he asked me what impres- 
sion the latest tidings had made upon the heart of 
Marie Louise, I replied that the story of so many 
misfortunes had been told her by the Austrian Em- 
press, who seemed reserved for this sort of communi- 
cations. This princess had come eagerly to Marie 
Louise. Their private interview lasted until it was 
time to sit down at table. The mother-in-law had 
a very marked appearance of satisfaction. On the 
features of Marie Louise I perceived an emotion she 
was trying to subdue. I sat opposite their Majesties, 
and lost not an expression of their faces." 

This emotion which Marie Louise sought vainly to 
conceal, is the attenuating circumstance we plead in 
her favor. Were not the politicians who surrounded 
the poor young wife with so many snares, and labored 
so systematically to turn her from her duties and cor- 
rupt her, the real criminals ? Left to herself, — let 
us render her this justice, — she would have played a 
wholly different part. They abused her youth, her 
feebleness. That is why, less severe than posterity, 
her husband pardoned her. On the rock of Saint 
Helena he had not a single word of bitterness, a 
single word of reproach for the faithless one. And, 
at the beginning of his testament he thus invokes 
those three great souvenirs, — Religion, Country, and 
Marie Louise : — 

"April 15, 1821. At Longwood, Island of Saint 
Helena. 1. I die in the Apostolic and Roman relig- 



THE NORTHUMBERLAND. 275 



ion, in whose bosom I was born more than fifty years 
ago ; 2. I desire that my ashes may repose beside the 
Seine, in the midst of that French people I have so 
much loved ; 3. I have always been satisfied with my 
dearest wife, Marie Louise ; I have preserved to the 
last moment the tenderest sentiments toward her ; I 
pray her to be careful to secure my son from the 
snares which still surround his childhood." 

Alas ! why was not Marie Louise more worthy of 
this eulogy of the prisoner ? Why had he not the 
right to say of her what he had said of his brother 
Jerome's wife : " The Princess Catherine of WUrtem- 
berg has written her name in history with her own 
hands." There was a devoted, disinterested, cour- 
ageous spouse, the true model of wives and mothers ! 
When, in 1814, every inducement, every possible 
effort, was made to divorce her, so as to marry her to 
some rich and powerful prince, some sovereign possi- 
bly, she wrote to her father, the King of Wiirtem- 
berg: "Forced by political reasons to espouse the 
King, my husband, fate willed that I should find my- 
self the happiest woman in existence. I bear towards 
my husband all sentiments united — love, tenderness, 
esteem. In this painful moment, would the best of 
fathers destroy my internal happiness, the sole happi- 
ness, indeed, which remains to me ? " And the noble 
Princess loved exile and poverty with her husband 
better than native land and wealth without him. 

This difference between the conduct of Catherine 
of Wiirtemberg and that of Marie Louise is easily 



276 ELBA, AND THE HUNBEED BAYS. 

explained. It must be admitted, women never push 
devotion and charity to heroism except when they 
have love for a motive — love human or divine, the 
love of the lover for her well-beloved, of the wife for 
her husband, of the mother for her child, of the 
Christian for her God. Then the feeble sex becomes 
strong. Then are realized those grand words of the 
Imitation of Jesus Christ : " Love is capable of all ; 
it accomplishes many things which exhaust those 
who do not love. Love watches always, and even in 
slumber does not sleep. No fatigue wearies it; no 
fear troubles it ; but, like a living and ardent flame, 
it always ascends on high and opens a sure passage 
through every obstacle." Why was one of these 
princesses sublime, and the other vulgar? For a 
very simple reason : Catherine of Wiirtemberg was 
in love with Jerome ; Marie Louise was not in love 
with Napoleon. 



INDEX. 



Aix in Savoy, Marie Louise takes 
the baths at, 31 et seq. 

Alexander I. ; magnanimity of, to 
Napoleon, 5 ; caricature of, 54 ; 
interest of, in Marie Louise, 73; 
intimacy of, with Eugene de 
Beauharnais, 74; his sympathy 
with Marie Louise, 75 ; his ill 
luck at the Princess Esterhazy's 
lottery, 79; indignation of, at 
the secret treaty against him, 
127; under the spell of Madame 
de Krudener, 127; opposes the 
suppression of the tricolored flag, 
128; his antipathy to the Bour- 
bons, 129 ; conversation of, on 
the situation of France, 130; will- 
ing to establish Marie Louise as 
Regent, 130 ; favors the Duke of 
Orleans, 131. 

Arndt, Maurice, his Catechism for 
German Soldiers and Military 
Men, 114 et seq. 

Arrighi, Yicar-General of Elba, 
issues his charge respecting Na- 
poleon, 16. 

Azores, Talleyrand proposes to re- 
move Napoleon to, 80, 82. 

Bassano, Duke of, urges Napoleon 
to seize the reins of government, 
202. 

Bausset, Baron de, interview of, 
with a Polish count, 293. 

Beauharnais, Eugene de, intimacy 
of, with Alexander I., 74. 

Beker, General, sent by the Minis- 
ter of War to take charge of 
Napoleon, 204 ; his magnanimous 



loyalty, 205; takes Napoleon's 
proposal to attack the Allies, to 
the Provisional Government, 211. 

Bellange, Hippolyte, his painting 
of the agony of the Guard, 109. 

Bellerophon, the, takes Napoleon to 
England, 241 ; goes to Plymouth, 
242; transfers Napoleon to the 
Northumberland at Start Point, 
257. 

Bertrand, General, describes Napo- 
leon's journey to Elba, 6. 

Bertrand, Madame, tries to throw 
herself overboard, 253. 

Bonaparte, Joseph, meets Marie 
Louise at Se'cheron, 32. 

Bonaparte, Lucien, recalled by 
Napoleon, 142; describes the 
conduct of the Assembly after 
Waterloo, 177 ; dialogue of, with 
Napoleon, 181 ; addresses the 
Chambers, 183 et seq. ; on the ab- 
dication, 188 ; takes the oath to 
Napoleon II., 192 ; avows the loss 
of the imperial cause, 192. 

Bourmont, General de, and other 
officers go over to the enemy 
before Waterloo, 157. 

Brignole, Countess of, lady of honor 
to Marie Louise, 5 ; implores 
Marie Louise to rejoin Napoleon, 
132. 

Bunbury, Sir Henry, reads to Na- 
poleon the decision of the British 
Government as to his exile, 248. 

Caffarelli, Madame, her recollec- 
tions of Napoleon at Malmuison, 
201. 



277 



278 



INDEX, 



Carnot, named by Napoleon Min- 
ister of the Interior, 104; sup- 
ports the idea of a dictatorship 
for Napoleon after Waterloo, 176. 

Caroline Murat, Queen of Naples, 
25. 

Caroline, Princess of Wales, char- 
acter of, 48; has an interview 
with Marie Louise, 49. 

Castlereagh, Lord, rudeness of, to 
Marie Louise, 75. 

Chateaubriand, reflections of, on 
hearing the cannonading of 
Waterloo, 162 ; quoted, 193, 256, 
261, 262, 268, 269. 

Constant, Benjamin, tergiversation 
of, 108. 

Dalesme, General, delivers the com- 
mand of Elba to Napoleon, 12; 
proclamation of, to the Elbans, 12. 

Declaration of March 13, a medley 
of hate and terror, 113. 

Decres, Duke, makes every effort 
to save Napoleon from captivity, 
207. 

Domon, General, sent by Napoleon 
to make a reconnoissance, 163; 
reports that Bliicher is coming 
up instead of Grouchy, 164. 

Drouot, General, receives from 
General Dalesme the command 
of Elba, 12. 

Elba, Francis I. objects to, as a 
place of exile for Napoleon, 4; 
Napoleon takes possession of, 
14; Napoleon's return from, an- 
nounced in Vienna, 79; the em- 
barkation, etc., 82. 

England, opposition in, to the atti- 
tude of the Ministry towards 
France, 126; Napoleon seeks an 
asylum in, 224. 

Esterhazy, Princess Paul, gems 
worn by, 58 ; lottery at the house 
of, 79. 

Etruria, the King of, at Paris, 57 ; 
the Queen of, disputes the pos- 



session of Parma with Marie 
Louise, 57. 
Exelmans, General, declares resist- 
ance useless and the Tuileries 
is opened to Napoleon, 102. 

" Field of May," the ceremony of, 
143, 145. 

Fouche, his contradictory orders as 
to Napoleon's departure, 206. 

Francis II., his adroit alienation of 
his daughter from Napoleon, 2; 
letter of, to Napoleon, concerning 
Marie Louise, 3; to Metternich, 
respecting Napoleon's place of 
exile, 4; has no longer sympathy 
for him, 5; refuses to recognize 
his daughter as a sovereign, 23. 

Gourgaud, General, permitted to 
accompany Napoleon, 258. 

Grenoble, gates of, forced by Napo- 
leon's soldiers, 96. 

Grouchy goes to Wavres instead of 
to Waterloo, 164 ; fails to arrive, 
166 ; safe at Laon, 186. 

Guard, Old, Napoleon's, lands at 
Elba, 18 ; detachment of, at Elba, 
accompanies Napoleon on his re- 
turn, 85; charges at Waterloo 
and covers the retreat, 167. 

Hortense, Queen, insists on Napo- 
leon's accepting her diamond 
necklace, 213. 

Hotham, Admiral, visits Napoleon 
on the Bellerophon, 238. 

Inconstant, the, Napoleon's return 
from Elba in, 83. 

Jaucourt, M. de, letter of, to Talley- 
rand, on the situation of France, 
126. 

Josephine, Napoleon recalls his life 
with, at Malmaison, 201. 

Jung, Colonel, quoted, 107. 

Keith, Admiral, demands Napo- 
leon's sword, 260. 



INDEX. 



279 



Krudener, Madame de, her fatal 
influeuce over Alexander I., 127. 

Labedoyere, General de, carries his 
regiment over to Napoleon, 95 ; 
speaks hotly against those who 
refuse to recognize Napoleon II., 
193 ; excluded by the government 
of Louis XVIII. from amnesty, 
252. 
La Bruyere, quotation from, 54. 
Lafayette, describes Napoleon's ap- 
pearance, 152; discourse of, in 
the Chamber after Waterloo, 178; 
sends word to Napoleon that he 
must abdicate at once or be de- 
posed, 186. 
Laon, the news of Napoleon's abdi- 
cation reaches the soldiers at, 
198. 
Las Cases, Count de, quoted, 219; 
agitation of, on hearing that 
Napoleon was to be sent to 
Saint Helena, 243 ; describes the 
thronging of the people to view 
Napoleon at Plymouth, 245; 
chosen by Napoleon to accom- 
pany him to Saint Helena, 253; 
describes the interior of the 
Northinnhcrland, 263. 
Las Cases, Countess de, meets her 

husband «,t Malmaison, 202. 
La Tour-du-Pin, Baron de, his ac- 
count of the death and funeral of 
Queen Marie Caroline, 29; letters 
of, concerning Marie Louise at the 
Vienna Congress, 55; concerning 
the tournament, 59, 60 ; concern- 
ing Count Neipperg, 63; regard- 
ing the "Little Bonaparte," 66. 
Laval ette makes a way for Napo- 
leon to enter the Tuileries, 103. 
Ligne, Prince de, interest of in 

Napoleon's son, 69. 
Ligny, battle of, gained by Napo- 
leon, 157. 
Ix)uis XVI., mass of expiation 

offered for at Vienna, 71. 
Louis XVIII., address of, to the 



Chambers before his flight, 99; 
takes flight, 100. 

Maitland, Captain, receives Napo- 
leon's envoys, 224 ; his courtesy 
to the French oflScers sent by 
Napoleon, 226; declares his in- 
tentions with regard to the 
French frigates, 227 ; advises Na- 
poleon's taking refuge in Eng- 
land, 228, 232; emotion of, at 
Napoleon's departure from the 
Bellerophon, 258. 
Manuel, proclaims Napoleon 11. as 

nominal sovereign, 196. 
Marie Caroline, Queen of the Two 
Sicilies, her history and traits, 
24 et seq. ; her adventurous jour- 
ney to Vienna, 26; urges Marie 
Louise to rejoin Napoleon, 27 ; 
death of, 29. 
Marie Louise, her gradual transfor- 
mation, 1; leaves France, 5, 11; 
her suite and journey, 5 et seq. ; 
expenses of, 6 ; her regret at not 
having met her husband at Fon- 
tainebleau, 6; her solicitude for 
Napoleon, 7 ; her final separation 
from him decided by the Aus- 
trian Government, 8; arrives at 
Schoenbrunn, 10; her life there, 
22; her sisters, 22; visited by 
Queen Marie Caroline, 27; goes 
to Aix in Savoy, as the Countess 
of Colerno, 32 ; met and escorted 
by General Count Neipperg, 33; 
surrounded by Imperialists and 
still true to Napoleon, ;>4; her 
correspondence with Me'neval, 
35 ; the French Government un- 
easy about her, 40; in Switzer- 
land with Neipperg, 42, 46; at 
Braunau, 52 ; not present at the 
fetes of the Vienna Congress, 55; 
attends the rehearsal of the tour- 
nament, 58; visits the Russian 
Empress, 62 ; removes the French 
imperial arms from her liveries, 
62; begins to love Count Neip- 



280 



INDEX. 



perg, 63; holds no communica- 
tion with Napoleon without her 
father's consent, 65; her ambi- 
tion to be Duchess of Parma, 72 ; 
sympathy of Alexander I. with, 
75; the stipulations of the Fon- 
tainebleau treaty with respect to 
her, disregarded, 75; refuses to 
be content with Lucca, 77; con- 
sents not to take her son there, 
77 ; hears of Napoleon's quitting 
Elba, 111 ; her struggle with 
regard to joining Napoleon, 112 ; 
causes Count Neipperg to write 
to Metternich that she had no 
part in Napoleon's projects, 116; 
enthralled by General Neipperg, 
120 ; declares to Meneval that she 
will not return to France, 124; 
the results of her decision, 125 ; 
Alexander I. walling to establish 
her as Regent, 130 ; her indiffer- 
ence to Napoleon, 131; her con- 
stant intimacy with General 
Neipperg, 133 ; her lack of regret 
for the death of General Neip- 
perg's wife, 134; her strange af- 
fection for him, 134; persists in 
her refusal to go to France, 135 ; 
gives up her son, 136 ; bids Mene- 
val adieu, and declares a separa- 
tion from Napoleon a necessity, 
137 ; letters of Metternich to, on 
Napoleon's fate, 271 ; her senti- 
ments towards Napoleon devoid 
of love, 276. 
Meneval, Baron de, in the suite of 
Marie Louise, 6; letter of, con- 
cerning Marie Louise at Vienna, 
66 ; on the hostility at Vienna to 
Marie Louise and her son, 67 ; 
conversation of, with Marie 
Louise, concerning her course, 
124 ;_ his journal kept at Schoen- 
brunn, 133; his last interview 
with Marie Louise, 135, 137; 
takes leave of Napoleon's son, 
136; gives Napoleon news of 
his wife's decision and of his son, 



138; describes his demeanor, 
140. 

Meurthe, Boulay de la, asserts that 
by Napoleon's abdication, his 
son reigns in due course, 195. 

Michel, Colonel, brings to Paris the 
news of Waterloo, 174. 

Michelet, quoted, 200. 

Military fete given in the Champ- 
de-Mars by the Imperial Guard, 
106. 

Moniteur Universel, account in, of 
a grand rout in Vienna during 
the Congress, 61 ; the proclama- 
tion of Napoleon in, before Water- 
loo, 172. 

Montebello, Countess of, in the 
suite of Marie Louise, 5. 

Montesquiou, Countess of, gov- 
erness of the King of Rome, 2, 5, 
65; deprived of the care of Napo- 
leon's son, 117; not allowed to 
return to France, 132. 

Montrond, M. de, sent to Vienna to 
endeavor to recall Marie Louise 
to her husband, 120; his interview 
with Talleyrand and others, 121 
et seq.; brings to Napoleon let- 
ters and the details of his mis- 
sion, 123. 

Murat, reconciled to Napoleon by 
the Princess Borghese, 119 
beaten at Tolentino, 134, 144 
proclamation of, at Rimini, 143 
exiled to Provence, 144. 

Musset, Alfred de, quoted, 9. 

Naples surrendered to the English 
and Austrians by Madame Murat, 
144. 

Napoleon supposes Francis I. is in- 
terested in his fate, 5 ; arrives at 
Elba, 11 ; ceremony of embarka- 
tion, 13; official report of his 
taking possession of the island, 
14 ; visits the public institutions, 
15 ; forms his court and receives 
l^is subjects, 17; his army, 18; 
happy at Elba, 20; unwilling to 



INDEX. 



281 



have Marie Louise go to Aix, 
31 ; visited by the Countess Wa- 
lewska, 43 ; letter of, to the Grand 
Duke of Tuscany, enclosing one 
for Marie Louise, 64 ; the return 
of, from Elba, announced in 
Vienna, 79 ; the embarkation, 83 ; 
incidents of the voyage, 83 et 
seq. ; his proclamations to the 
French people and the army, 85 
et seq. ; lands in the Bay of Juan, 
87 ; takes his route for Paris, 88 
et seq. ; meets the Royalist Guard 
and receives their allegiance, 94 
et seq.; at Grenoble, 97; writes 
to Marie Louise asking her to 
rejoin him, 97; enters Lyons 
in triumph, 98; meets Ney at 
Auxerre, 100; arrives at Fon- 
tainebleau, 101; enters the Tui- 
leries, 103; reviews the soldiers 
and names Carnot Minister of 
the Interior, 104; visits Saint 
Denis, 106; grand fete in his 
honor in the Champ-de-Mars, 
106; finds the evidences of gen- 
eral tergiversation, 108; strives 
to regain possession of his wife 
and son, 116 ; sends letters to 
Vienna to this end, 116; sends de 
Montrond to Vienna to recall 
Marie Louise to him, 120; re- 
ceives from Meneval the intelli- 
gence of his wife's decision and 
of the fate of his son, 139; no 
longer entertains any illusions, 
140; recalls Lucien, 142; his pro- 
pensity to sleep, 142; refuses to 
abdicate, 143; exiles Murat, 144; 
celebrates the inauguration of 
the liberal Empire in the " Field 
of May," 145; his speech, 148; 
addresses the National Guard, 
149 ; at the Tuileries for the last 
time, 150; his discourse at the 
opening of the Chambers, 152; 
and to the Chamber of Pe^rs, 
153 ; his plans at Waterloo, 157 ; 
gains the battle of Ligny, 157; 



physically and mentally fatigued, 
159; fears that Wellington will 
retreat, 160; still has illusions, 
160; gives the signal for battle to 
begin, 161 ; in doubt about the 
arrival of Grouchy, 163; sends 
re-enforcements to Ney, 165 ; hes» 
itatesand becomes perplexed, 166 ^ 
sends the Guard to the attack, 
167; gives the signal to retreat, 
168 ; his own retreat, 170; in Paris 
again, 174 ; undecided and power- 
less, 175 ; asks for a temporary 
dictatorship from the Chambers, 
176; waver? and feels himself 
vanquished, 179; dialogue of, 
with Lucien Bonaparte, 181 ; the 
common people and soldiers re- 
ceive him with enthusiasm, 182; 
informed by Lucien that a coup 
d'etat or an abdication are the 
only alternatives, 185; receives 
word from Lafayette that he 
must abdicate at once or be de- 
posed, 186 ; abdicates in favor of 
his son, 188; his address to the 
deputation from the Assembly, 
190; goes to Malmaison, 198; 
recalls his life there with Jose- 
phine, 201; delays his departure, 
203; decree of the Provisional 
Government for the transporta- 
tion of, to America, 204; misgiv- 
ings of, as to the intentions of 
the Provisional Government, 205 ; 
Fouche urges that he should de- 
part in disguise, 206; contradic- 
tory instructions from Fouche, 
206; refuses to escape on a mer- 
chant vessel, 207; prepares to 
depart, but cherishes a lingering 
hope, 208 : French frigates placed 
at his disposal, 210; proposes 
to General Beker to take com- 
mand of the army again, 210; 
sends him to the Provisional Gov- 
ernment with the proposal, 211 ; 
which is rejected, 211; leaves 
Malmaison with his attendants, 



282 



INDEX. 



212 ; accepts a diamond necklace 
from Queen Hortense, 213; at 
Kambouillet, 214; still cherishes 
illusions, 216; is welcomed at 
Rochef ort by the National Guards, 
209; detained there by unfavor- 
able winds and the English ships, 
217; propositions made for his 
flight, 221 ; goes on board the 
ISaale, 222; decides to confide 
himself to the generosity of Eng- 
land, 224; sends envoys to Cap- 
tain Maitland of the Bellerophon, 
224; orders the ISaale to sail at 
once, 229; receives a visit from 
Joseph Bonaparte, 230 ; letter of, 
to the Prince Regent, 233; his 
instructions to General Gour- 
gaud, 234; goes on board the 
Bellerophon, 237; his suite, 238; 
drills the soldiers on the Bellero- 
phon, 239 ; breakfasts on the Su- 
perb with Admiral Hotham, 240 ; 
incidents of the voyage to Eng- 
land, 240; arrives at Torbay, 
241 ; the Bellerophon ordered to 
Plymouth, 242 ; curiosity excited 
by his presence, 244; made ac- 
quainted with the decision to 
send him to Saint Helena, 247; 
his speech in reply, 248 et seg. ; 
etiquette observed with, on the 
Bellerophon, 252 ; Las Cases com- 
bats the idea of suicide which he 
inclined to, 254; his written pro- 
test, 255 ; conceals his money and 
diamonds, 257; does not sur- 
render his sword to Admiral 
Keith, 260; is transferred to the 
Northumberland, 260 ; his habits 
on shipboard, 264 ei seq. ; spends 
his mornings in dictation, 268; 
in sight of Saint Helena, 269; 
testament of, at Longwood, 274. 
Napoleon H., Napoleon abdicates 
in his favor, 188 ; proclaimed Em- 
peror by the Chamber of Depu- 
ties, 195; his reign a phantasm, 
197 ; see King of Rome. 



Neipperg, General Count, his char- 
acter and career, 2 ; escorts Marie 
Louise into Aix, 33; closely at- 
tendant upon Marie Louise, 46; 
his success as the chamberlain of 
Marie Louise, 63 ; begins the war 
with Murat, 118, 120; his influ- 
ence over Marie Louise, 133 ; de- 
feats Murat, 134; death of his 
wife, 134. 

Nettement, M. Alfred, quoted, 190, 
251. 

Ney, Marshal, declares for Napo- 
leon, 99; meets him at Auxerre, 
100 ; gives a banquet to the ofl&- 
cers at Lille, 105; imsuccessful 
at Quatre-Bras, 157; attacks La 
Haye Sainte, 164 ; his intrepidity, 
165; tries to meet death on the 
battle-field, 168; his despairing 
words before the Chamber of 
Peers, 191. 

Northumberland, the. Napoleon 
transferred to, 260; description 
of, 263; crossing the line, 267. 

Orleans, Duke of, Alexander L, in 
favor of a monarchy under, 128, 
131. 

Pacha de Surene, comedy played 
at the Vienna Congress, 60. 

Philibert, Captain, of the Saale re- 
fuses to sail at Napoleon's orders, 
229. 

Ponce, Captain, of the Meduse, he- 
roic proposition of, 229. 

Provisional Government, decree of, 
as to Napoleon, 203 ; rejects Na- 
poleon's proposal to attack the 
Allies, 211. 

Rochefort, affection for Napoleon 
at, 217; port of, blockaded by 
English ships, 218. 

Rome, King of, instructed to love 
and pray for his father, 2; no 
longer a king, 6 ; his melancholy 
and precocious ways, and instruc- 



INDEX. 



288 



tion, 68; removed from the care 
of the Countess of Montesquiou, 
117 ; see Napoleon II. 
Royalists, the, in France, desire the 
success of the foreigner, 141. 

Savary, General, excluded from 
amnesty by the government of 
Louis XVIII., 252. 

Segur, General de, will not recount 
the details of Napoleon's down- 
fall, 156. 

Schoenbrunn, fete at, 71. 

Scott, Sir Walter, quoted, 207, 208; 
describes the concourse at Ply- 
mouth to view Napoleon, 246. 

Soult, Marshal, his tergiversation, 
108. 

Talleyrand, Prince, letter to Metter- 
nich about Marie Louise's stay at 
Aix, 41 ; letter of, to Louis XVIII. 
upon the levity of Metternich, 
69; desires to withhold Parma 
from Marie Louise, 73 ; letter of, 
respecting Alexander I., 74, 76 
et seq. ; describes the Lenten 
dissipations at Vienna, 78; ob- 
tains the signatures of the Pow- 
ers to the declaration of March 
13, 113; sends Louis XVIII. the 
Warning to the Nations, 114; 
writes to Louis XVIII. respecting 
de Montrond, 122 ; writes to Louis 
XVIII. explaining the hostility of 
Alexander I. to him, 129 ; reports 



a conversation of Alexander I. 
with Lord Clancarty, 120. 

Tolentino, battle of, 134, 144; the 
" prologue to Waterloo," 144. 

Torbay, the Bellerophon with Na- 
poleon at, 241 ; commotion in the 
harbor of, 242. 

Tournament during the Vienna 
Congress, 58. 

Tyrol, the, restored to Austria, 9. 

Vicenza, the Duke of, pleads Na- 
poleon's cause for regaining 
Dossession of his wife and son, 
116. 

Victor Hugo, verses of, on Water- 
loo, 155. 

Vienna Congress, entry of the 
sovereigns, 54 ; festivities of, 56. 

"Vigil of Waterloo, The," 158. 

Walewska, Countess, visits Napo- 
leon at Elba, 43. 

Warning to the Natio7is, the, 114. 

Waterloo, Napoleon's plans before, 
157; battle of, 161 et seq.; car- 
nage after, 173. 

Wellington's admiration of the 
charges of the French cuirassiers, 
165 ; his sadness after Waterloo, 
170. 

Werner, fashionable preacher at 
Vienna, 70. 

Wiirtemberg, Princess Catharine 
of, her fidelity to her husband, 
275. 



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